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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/28868244">One Dog Night</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/WaxDragons/pseuds/WaxDragons'>WaxDragons</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Hellsing</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>3rd person reader-insert, F/M, I didn't intend this but here we are 20k words later, I made decisions for better or worse, Knotting, Off to Horny Jail for Werewolf Crimes, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings, Reader-Insert, Smut, Some cuddling but not nearly enough, You and the Captain Catch feelings, no betas we die like men</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-13 06:21:35</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Explicit</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>24,610</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/28868244</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/WaxDragons/pseuds/WaxDragons</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Set in the background when Integra and Maxwell met to open conversations on Iscariot involvement with Millennium, Hans gets frisky with the reader in 3rd person while he's supposed to be scouting for threats in the Imperial War Museum. After getting interrupted, the fling expands into a whole day affair and y'all catch feelings.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Captain Hans Günsche/Reader</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>26</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>One Dog Night</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>First thing's first, I wrote this to be highly self indulgent. It spiraled from quick lighthearted fling (sections 1-9, if you were wondering) into a catch feelings fic before I realized it. We've got almost getting railed in a museum, cliché rescue from a bad fate, dinner date, and then finally getting laid. Probably could have written more of that, but I just wanted to be done with it. But to that end, I read Hans as a bit of a cheeky dude; in most of his manga panels or frames all I see is "I regret my life's decisions" and I vibe with that. I still definitely take a few liberties, though (you know, like making him a shitty father figure to Schrodinger).</p><p>Now onto the business. Feel free to sub in any name of your choice for [NAME] and tailor it as you see fit. [DRINK] and [FOOD] are there for a briefish dinner date. Reader is, in order to excuse the foundation of the plot, filthy rich. This also pulls heavily from my headcanons on the poor Captain. I'm half tempted to write a sequel, but it probably won't happen for a while, and I have no idea what route I'll take if I do. </p><p>All that aside: happy reading. If I missed anything, let me know.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>-1-</p><p>Hans finds himself wandering the imperial war museum, bored as hell while he scouts out potential trouble for the Major, who had the luxury of sitting in the ritzy café and watching his rivals from a distance. Truthfully speaking, Hans has no interest in any of this: he’s an old war dog 50 years past his ideal retirement who’s forced to see every atrocity he’s ever committed in his mind’s eye for every damnable waking moment of the day.</p><p>While Montana may derive orgasmic joy from such a life, Hans does not.</p><p>That said, all he’s really seen was a brief glimpse of the standoff between Alucard and Anderson before it was interrupted by a parade of elderly Japanese people led by a fledgling vampire. She wasn’t a threat, in any sense of the word, and Walter had communicated as much. Since the terrible two had gone home that leaves nothing else in this space that could go wrong.</p><p>Hans would know, he’s been through the damn place no fewer than three times while Montana sits on his rotund mechanical ass and gets a hateboner from watching two prissy children verbally duke it out.</p><p>Hans was too old for this shit.</p><p>When he finishes another round and gets back to the hall of paintings that almost became the scene of a bloody battle that morning, he finds a lone woman standing in front of… whatever that damn painting was with the two lines of soldiers with spears. Really, he was never a man for artwork.</p><p>But this woman? He hadn’t noticed her yet; or sized her up as a threat. For lack of anything better to do on a dreary weekday morning, he slips right up to her side to casually evaluate her.</p><p>-2-</p><p>[NAME], just trying to enjoy the third day of her weeklong stay in London before a month of driving across Western Europe, had chosen the Imperial War Museum for her morning’s itinerary when a very curious stranger slipped over to her side.</p><p>Although she had barely caught a glance of him, his profile stuck a frog clean in her throat and threatened to send a blush spilling across her easily stained cheeks. He looked like a statue fit for a museum—tall as can be with a generously chiseled face and delicious strong arms. His mustard yellow shirt and camo cargo pants were ugly as hell but, as long as she thought about his body, he was completely tantalizing.</p><p>A fling.</p><p>He would make a <em>bloody </em>good fling to kick off her journey if he would be so generous to replace the frog in her throat with something else.</p><p>The mental image finally does send a light blush across her cheeks, inspiring her wrap her arms around herself and stare down at her feet. At a loss for how she could possibly approach him, she bounces once onto her heels and stands up straight, letting her arms drop back to her sides and her mouth start flying before she could hold the first thought to strike her in.</p><p>“So have you ever played fuck, marry, kill in an art museum?”</p><p>That alone is enough to mortify her. That’s not even the proper adaption of the game, for goodness’ sakes. Fortunately, the hall was empty around them. Unfortunately, the words keep flowing. “I mean I know this isn’t an <em>art</em> museum—this is a <em>war</em> museum but is has art so have you ever stopped in a hall and looked at the paintings and just <em>thought about it</em>?”</p><p>-3-</p><p>Hans snorts as soon as she asks him if he’s considered it. The thought? Unfathomable. He doesn’t know what that game is—it sounds like something Montana would revel in—but her confident delivery and immediately mortified expression he catches from a side glance are endlessly entertaining. Nonetheless he turns his head to her and quirks an eyebrow, sizing her up in the blink of an eye.</p><p>She’s generously portioned, if he was being perfectly honest. Wide hips and juicy breasts and thick thighs he can picture his head between in a snap. For a hot blooded, sexually starved man like him, she was quite the sight to behold. A whole meal, if you would, topped with a pretty face and neatly tied up hair.</p><p>Choosing to play along with her game, he brings a hand to his chin and slowly shakes his head no, wordlessly daring her to go on. The faint blush on her face darkens for a moment and her big eyes somehow widen even more.</p><p>“Well if I had to pick from the hall it’d be a toss up between a lot of things so let’s just look at this painting,” she begins, gesturing to the massive canvas they’re in front of and tearing her eyes from his face. “I’d pick this one to fuck—he looks the most clean of them—this one to marry because he looks like he’s matured a bit—and this one to kill because his moustache screams perv.”</p><p>Hans snorts at that again, the humanity in her crass and simple explanation for something so inane tickling his humor. It’s the only human humor he’s really had in ages, but he can let that slide.</p><p>Without giving it much thought he holds up one finger and points to a random man. Then, a second finger and another random man. Then, a third finger, and a third random man. The woman nods, as if considering his choices when she turns her gaze back to look at him, eyes shining with something foreign that he hadn’t seen in a long time.</p><p>“Were you pointing to the horse or the dude on horseback for the first one?” she asks. Hans pauses for a moment before the hilarity of the situation dawns on him and he allows himself one small, breathy chuckle.</p><p>This could certainly be a way to spend the rest of his time here. Nobody would be a threat to Montana.</p><p>-4-</p><p>She made him laugh!</p><p>Emboldened by her success, she considers the horse angle for a moment, turning back to look at the picture for delivery of her next mortifying idea. “I can see where you’re coming from. You’re a big guy, and you’d need something substantial to get you going.”</p><p>She casts a quick side glance to see his stare drop, quickly taking in her body once more. Fighting the urge to cover herself from his penetrating gaze, she looks down the hall at the other paintings lining the walls.</p><p>After a deafening silence he grunts, likely in agreement with her statement. Turning back towards him, she sees him jerk his chin down the hall. <em>Continue. </em></p><p>Before moving, she reaches an open hand out to him and waits for another agonizingly long moment of silence before he takes it. A stupid idea, but at least he went with it. His hand is huge, and his grip is warm and firm. If she were to imagine his hands anywhere else it would be sensory overload—hell, if she couldn’t actually go through with the idea of a fling to kick off a wild Europe trip, she could always coddle the memory of his hands. Rough and calloused, undeniably those of a down-to-earth man.</p><p>As she started in on singling out the next wall as a pool for the cursed and incorrectly played FMK game, a part of her mind wandered on a tangent, considering what he could’ve done for a living. Military isn’t out of the question, between his intimidating stature, wordless, rough-around-the-edges personality, and thin silver ball chain around his neck.</p><p>Mercy, his neck.</p><p>Thicker than a tree trunk, lined with muscle and speaking to the treasures he’s got hidden behind the draping curtain of his shirt. He’s such a catch she wonders why he’s even chatting her up. Well, he may not exactly be chatting but the point stands. She spits out some half-baked set of choices after a moment of thought, and he fires back with one shortly thereafter. He’d fuck the plane, if she followed his pointing gesture correctly. Stifling an inappropriate giggle, she tightens her grip on his hand for a moment and turns her eyes to him.</p><p>His eyes are the most fascinating things in the world. Two deep maroon saucers set between thick, wispy white locks of hair. She’d never seen maroon eyes on a person—had never known it was possible—but she wasn’t about to look a gift (draft) horse in the mouth. (Goodness, he was so <em>big</em>!)</p><p>-5-</p><p>Her giggle sounded like bells, and from that moment on Hans knew his fate was sealed. Her selections clearly grew more half-assed as she snuck not-very-subtle glances at him. <em>At least she tried,</em> he thought to himself as he gently ran his thumb over her knuckles to watch a suppressed shudder work its way down from her shoulders.</p><p>There was something about her crass yet lighthearted, childish nature that kept him standing there with her after the subtle suggestion of a delightful one-time affair drew him in.</p><p>He’d need to find somewhere just out of reach of the security cameras. After his rounds, he knew four such secluded corners and corridors he could subtly direct her to; patiently playing this game in the direction of his end goal.</p><p>Sure, it would be a bit animal to take her in a hallway, but he <em>was</em> an animal and she’d just have to live with that. Montana would likely bask in the deception of the situation, watching a woman unwittingly descending to the level of a dog for not more than a fling. It’s just his kind of mad humor.</p><p>So, he directed her down a few more halls of art to the nearest secluded, unmonitored hallway (down towards the bathrooms, actually) after a few more increasingly disinterested rounds of game. The second she was out of the last security camera’s frame he had her pinned to the wall in a flash.</p><p>That alone should’ve been enough to startle her into realizing he wasn’t human, but she was staring him dead in the eye, lips parted in a quiet gasp with a deep red blush fanning over her cheeks. He held their now clasped hands above her head and firmly set his other hand on the wall beside her head, leaning closer into her space and cautiously moving one knee closer to her legs.</p><p>He doesn’t know what possesses him, but he pauses, the tip of his nose barely touching hers; soaking in the lust of her gaze for a monster like him. That kind of attention is intoxicating, something he hasn’t enjoyed since the beginning of the war.</p><p>She smells faintly of vanilla and arousal, and it’s driving him mad.</p><p>-6-</p><p>[NAME] doesn’t remember how to move, how to urge him on when he pins her to the wall—she’s lost in his disturbingly close and deep eyes, half convinced they’re really a dark, glowing red. She does know she’s blushing; the scorching heat settling in her cheeks a tell-tale sign. Would she fuck him here? She never thought herself one for public sex but when his knee presses against hers and his hot breath fans over her face, all she can do is let his leg in.</p><p>A weak, begging whimper bubbles from her throat and that seems to be all the cue he needs to close his eyes, tilt his head, and close the gap between them. Her own eyes slip closed when his lips finally touch hers. They’re warm and rough and chapped, smudging the lip balm she’d applied somewhere over half an hour ago in his fervor to take her in.</p><p>By their difference in height he can’t press their bodies flush, and she can feel his frustration with this as he moves his lips against hers, a soft growl slipping from his mouth. [NAME] gasps and her knees weaken, allowing him to deepen their kiss and push his tongue inside her mouth while she slides down the wall bit by bit.</p><p>He pulls back for a moment and her eyes snap open, coming witness to an embarrassingly hot strand of saliva connecting them for a moment before it snaps. Taking a shuddering breath she prepares to say something before he releases her hand and grabs her hips. Her heart races in excitement as he lifts her, impossibly big and <em>wonderful</em> hands gripping her hips with such confidence she almost swoons.</p><p>He picks her up damn near a foot, pressing his hard, muscled body closely to hers, the top of his equally solid thigh rubbing against her crotch. Instead of saying anything, she huffs in awe and finally remembers how to use her arms, flinging them around his neck and trying to pull him back down only to find he’s as sturdy as rock. The thought sends a jolt running through her and she shifts on his thigh. “Do you want me to beg or something, big guy?” she rasps out.</p><p>His warm hands squeeze her hips for a moment while he surveys her face. The shadow that falls over his eyes is all she needs to understand he’d very much like her to beg.</p><p>Or something, [NAME] thinks, as he dives back down into a feverish kiss and cuts her off before she actually can say anything more. As if guided by instinct, he runs his teeth over her bottom lip and she shudders, his sharp canines teasing at something she can’t quiet comprehend at the beginning and end of the motion. So she gives up, opening her mouth and moving one of her arms from around his neck to tangle in his hair.</p><p>It’s surprisingly soft, a contrast against his impossibly hard body, and seems to wrap eagerly around her fingers when she suddenly grabs a fistful at a surprise nip. He growls possessively and she mewls, letting him steal another hot, open mouthed kiss while every coherent thought drains clean from her head.</p><p>-7-</p><p>She’s sinfully good, he thinks to himself as he forces his tongue in her mouth again. Something on her lips tastes divine, like he’s tasting leftover ambrosia from the heavens every time they shift against each other. And when she unwittingly grinds against his thigh for friction, Hans feels most thought clear straight out of his head as his dick steals a sizable portion of the blood running through his veins.</p><p>It’s easy; natural to hold her up and press his heaving chest against her soft bosom. Panting like a dog he savors how easily she gives into him, pleads for him to take control. <em>She has her own gravity</em>, he thinks when he pulls back again experimentally, finding that his reward is a barely muffled, pleading whine that urges him to draw back in.</p><p>It is a good thing the museum was not busy, or he would kill the next person to stumble upon them and take in the sight meant for him <em>and only him</em>. Bruising lips, ruby cheeks, and shining, desperately lustful eyes.</p><p>Hans drops back in quickly, picking up the French kiss where he’d left off, gradually resting more of her weight on his thigh, which she almost subconsciously twitches and writhes against, the rough fabric of his pants probably doing something to get her off.</p><p>Smiling wolfishly through the kiss, Hans finally sets all of her weight on his thigh, letting her keep herself balanced with arm around his neck and hand on the back of his head. Growling possessively again, his hands inch up to the hem of her shirt. It’s surprisingly soft for a plain cotton tee, but he finds that her skin underneath is even softer when his fingers creep underneath.</p><p>-8-</p><p>[NAME] knows she’s in real danger of drowning when he settles her on his thigh. She whimpers against his lips as his hands start a terrifyingly slow ascent past the hem of her shirt. It wasn’t until she was pressed against him with all of her weight that she realized she’d been needily grinding against him, chasing the tiny shocks of warmth to her core as she got wetter and wetter.</p><p>If he was serious about fucking this museum, they were fast approaching the line at which she could willfully deny him.</p><p>Instead of pulling away and making some coy remark, she simply whimpers into his mouth and pulls lightly at his hair. His soft snarl in response sends another jolt running through her and she finally bucks against him, sighing into him. Taking this as a good sign, he pushes his hands further under her shirt, caressing her sides with surprisingly tender care.</p><p>She bucks again, thoughts wandering to whether he was hard yet and what exactly she would be working with. The only real thought for a few minutes now, as she savored his rough kissing. If his dick was anything like the rest of him, she would be begging for him the rest of the night whether or not she knew his name.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p><em>How embarrassing</em>, she thought as she bucked against his thigh, losing her train of thought again. His hands resume their upward travel once more and he pulls back to take her in. She finally opens her eyes, chest heaving, to see that he looks barely perturbed beyond the predatory look in his eyes and small, heart stopping smile.</p><p><em>This whole fling thing was a wonderful idea</em>, she thinks. And then his pager beeps in his pocket and his smile crashes into a frown.</p><p>-9-</p><p>Fuck. Shit. Damn it.</p><p>Ignoring the throbbing need in his pants and her hot need against his thigh, Hans removes a hand from her shirt to snatch the pager out of his pocket and check the code. The Major needs him.</p><p>With an unhappy snarl he pulls his hands from her shirt and gradually lowers her back onto her own two feet. His mouth is twisted into a deep scowl, and he can see the slight edge of fear in her eyes at the surely terrifying look on his face. That was more like it, unfortunately. She should learn to fear him sooner or later, not try to fuck herself on his thigh when he growls at her like a dog.</p><p>“You have to go, don’t you?” she asks breathlessly. Hans stares down at her, sparing one quick nod while he tries to burn her strikingly beautiful face into his mind’s eye, her once organized look thrown into wonderful disarray. She frowns at him for a moment before the edges of her mouth turn up. “Call it serendipity then. A man should take a lady for dinner and a movie before they get down and dirty.”</p><p>Hans snorts at this, eyebrows furrowing at the amount of effort she’d expect him to expend if he wanted to pick back up where he left off, like she wasn’t about to let him claim her in public. “But I’ll tell you what,” she breathes, smile growing bit by bit, “if you meet me for dinner at six at a little pub called the Bulldog’s House along the same street as the Queen Victoria hotel, we can pick this right back up and keep going all night without the movie.”</p><p>He seriously considers her offer for a moment, hard-on throbbing almost painfully in his pants. Almost as if she can feel the faux innocent hope shining on her face, she bites her lip, batting her eyelashes at him once, twice, and thrice before he acquiesces—if only to get her to stop so that he can collect his thoughts and leave.</p><p>He nods once more and snakes a hand behind her neck, dropping down for one final, forceful kiss before turning tail and leaving her standing in the hallway. For a sudden and unplanned departure, that went well. She may not be worth getting burnt alive for, but that was <em>certainly</em> a way to blow time.</p><p>-10-</p><p>[NAME] watches him stalk off, catching a quick glimpse of his painfully hard looking boner when her heart stops in her chest. If he doesn’t join her for the night she’ll be extremely disappointed. Speaking honestly, that was awfully ballsy when she was about to let him fuck her even more senseless in a museum hallway.</p><p>She didn’t even have a condom with her!</p><p>He was rough, commanding, and kind of wild. Those were draws she hadn’t really realized or even considered before the mysterious man had pinned her against the wall and chased every semblance of logical thought from her head. What she wouldn’t give for another steamy kiss like that.</p><p>Grasping at her heart through her shirt, she takes a moment to lean against the museum wall and breathe deeply, taking stock of her surroundings. She was as wet as could be—probably ruined her underwear. Hopefully didn’t ruin her jeans. Her wallet is still there, judging by the bulge in her pocket.</p><p>Taking another deep breath, she pushes herself off the wall and looks around. A tour group of elderly Japanese folks starts to meander by, led by an overly excited, busty blonde policewoman. When they start pointing and whispering amongst themselves [NAME] nervously pulls her shirt down, realizing how criminally <em>fucked</em> she looks between the rumpled shirt and firey hot blush sitting on her cheeks.</p><p>Turning tail away from them, she ducks into the woman’s bathroom when she notices it. The first thing she notices inside is a mirror, which she fixates on above taking in the rest of her surroundings.</p><p>Her reflection is a mess: her bun is falling out, her lips are bruising, her cheeks are <em>burning</em>, and she looks like a wide eyed alien. It would take a while for her to calm down enough to continue the day’s exploration.</p><p>-11-</p><p>Hans finds the Major with Doc and Schrodinger in the café, sitting at a round table and chatting over tea and biscuits like authentic Brits. Hans had long since willed down the fire in his pants like the trained soldier he was and approaches casually, having already assessed that he hadn’t been called for a threat.</p><p>“Oh, Captain,” the Major chortles when he notices him, “how <em>wunderbar</em> that you’ve finally made your way back to us.” Hans finally notices that the young Hellsing and catholic bishop are nowhere to be found. Right: the man, the myth, the robot must be bored.</p><p>Once Hans reaches the table in a painfully human amount of time the Major motions to an empty chair and Schrodinger grabs a fourth teacup to finally fill from the communal pot. Hans takes a seat, ready for his public interrogation. They must have gotten a report on his vitals. That and Schrodinger’s criminally mischievous smile warns him of the unfortunate conversation to come.</p><p>“What did you get up to, Captain?” the Major asks, “Once our entertainment for the day left, we figured that we would sit around and enjoy a proper tea party, but you were nowhere to be found.” Schrodinger’s smile cracks even wider and he barely stops pouring the tea before the cup overflows. Doc fixes him with an unimpressed look before taking a sip of his own tea and pointedly turning his head away from the discussion at hand.</p><p>“Oh, I can tell you, Major,” Schrodinger sing songs. The hair on the back of Hans’ neck stands on end, but his poker face remains firm and his pulse even. Damn kid. The Major is smiling like a cat that just cornered a mouse. If it was possible, Doc is forcing an even greater amount of disinterest.</p><p>Before Schrodinger can speak again, Hans points at a woman across the room and taps two fingers to his mouth. That would sum it up without giving too much away.</p><p>Unfortunately, Schrodinger has a big mouth and, even as Hans levels him with a glare potent enough to make an average grown man keel over, the boy soldiers on to his Major’s rapturous enjoyment. “That’s not all, Major! Hans found a beautiful young lady that <em>asked him to dinner</em>. They were getting heated enough that he didn’t even notice me stop by!”</p><p>Hans’ glare has finally darkened enough to wilt Schrodinger. The further he had managed to get away from that temptress the more he thought it was an awful idea to wander out alone in the middle of enemy territory just to fuck for one night. It would be a miracle if neither vampire had picked up on the smell of a dog lingering around the museum. She was not worth it.</p><p>This was not going to end well.</p><p>-12-</p><p>Her first order of business is to carefully disentangle the two hair elastics barely containing her now droopy bun. It takes a few pulls and some careful untangling, but [NAME] frees them with relatively little struggle.</p><p>Slipping the elastics onto one wrist, she cards her hands through her hair and levels herself with a serious look in the mirror. Do the drugstores around here carry what she needs? All things considered she <em>was </em>on birth control, but was it still worth the risk of any unintended consequences? Satisfied that her hair is mostly oriented towards the back of her head, she gathers it in one hand and passes it back and forth, tightening the handful until she saw fit to pull the elastics over her wrist and around the base of the collection in a well-practiced motion. A little finagling later and it was a full-fledged bun sitting at the back of her head.</p><p>The next order of business was to check her pants—again, panties already ruined—and make sure that there wasn’t anything too noticeable. That involves taking a few quick steps from the mirror, popping her shoe-clad foot on the laminate counter and bending at surreal angles to try and peak at the crotch of her pants.</p><p>Lady luck must be smiling on her, as not one person comes into the bathroom as she does this.</p><p>Finally pulling her leg down and taking one long step back to the mirror and row of sinks. A couple of old elderly Japanese ladies finally wander in, sharing a look and muttering something about her before taking the only two stalls available in the room.</p><p>[NAME] focuses on the mirror and her still somewhat red face. She runs a tap, splashes her face a few times with some cool water, and her blush is gone. Fortune further smiles at her when she pats the pocket with her wallet and realizes her chapstick is still in there, ready for reapplication. Which she gratefully does, rubbing her lips together and savoring the faint taste of cherries.</p><p>Maybe the big guy liked cherries. With the way he kissed, he could probably knot a cherry stem with his tongue.</p><p>-13-</p><p>The Major lights up at Schrodinger’s statement. “Is that so?” he drawls, “Captain you simply must go. You’re quite lucky to have found a woman so accepting of your <em>disposition</em>.” Hans reminds himself that he cannot snarl at his Major, no matter how tempting the bait. It had been a long time since he’d been shock collared and it was not worth it again. Montana damn well knows that she didn’t know, and he’d be waiting for the fallout when she found out. It was an inevitability if he ever got intimate with her.</p><p>So, instead, he grunts. It’s even, uninclined to any course of action. Schrodinger’s ears twitch, the one dead giveaway that he wasn’t just a human with a weird sense of style. “Come on, Captain,” the boy joins in, “you looked like you were having a good time.”</p><p>The last thing he needed was Schrodinger goading him—especially when he couldn’t snap at the lesser warrant officer, either. It’s a damn shame he was such a well-trained dog.</p><p>“I think you should go take her for dinner,” the Major continues past Schrodinger, a dangerous edge to his jolly voice, “Escourt me back to our accommodations and take the night off—we leave tomorrow at 10:00 hours. Dress up and show her a good time.” With that he gestures to Doc, who, scowling all the while, pulls out a wallet and fishes out a hefty ₤300.</p><p>“Don’t spend it all in one place,” is all he bids. It’s meaningless, like all money is for their cohort. The minute he picks it up from the table and pockets it, his fate is sealed. Schrodinger pushes the full teacup in Hans’ direction. “Can’t we enjoy some tea first, Major?” He must be desperate to savor the outing and not return to the private airfield where their airship is docked. Hans can understand, having largely been locked away in their mostly underground base in Brazil. Fresh air was a blessing.</p><p>The Major fortunately hums and nods, putting off Hans’ reflection inevitable rejection and shaming.</p><p>-14-</p><p>It wasn’t originally in [NAME]’s itinerary for the day to make a quick trip back to her hotel to change her panties, but c’est la vie. The tube was quick enough, roomy in the early afternoon before people started bustling about again. And the sun was almost poking out behind the clouds too.</p><p>Keying into her room, she wonders how the night will play out. Her room is clean, looking almost as if it were completely undisturbed save for her lonely suitcase set on the luggage stand. It may be a long trip, but she didn’t bring much in the ways of fancy underwear. Or fancy clothing—she wasn’t expecting flings, or much fine dining, or any high-class outings.</p><p>Not that a pub would be a high-class outing, but she still wondered if she could drive him a little wild through dinner. Wind him up like a child’s toy and then let him go to town on her.</p><p>Closing and relocking the door, she stumbles into the room and over to her luggage, willing herself away from collapsing on the bed and ruining the housekeeper’s good job. Flipping open the top to look at the disorganized contents inside, she fishes around for a moment before pulling out a nice pair of panties—a bright and angry red she bought for shits and giggles but then discovered was comfortable.</p><p>There’s a chance it might be his speed. There’s a chance he’s got awful taste, like those cargo pants. And of course, there’s a chance that he would completely disregard her agonizing and raw dog her without a second thought or a moment’s hesitation.</p><p>It may as well be red.</p><p>With a quick glance to make sure the curtains were left closed, she sheds her jeans and undies, pulling on a new pair and feeling the sweet relief that comes with it. The ruined pair get sorted into the small but growing bag of dirty laundry tucked in her suitcase and the pants go back on. Finally, she could get on with the rest of her day!</p><p>Deep down, she knew he wouldn’t give much a damn. Although, then again, she did happen to have a low cut shirt she brought along on the trip…</p><p>-15-</p><p>Tea was over too soon. And then the drive back to the airfield was over too soon. And then the Major was kicking him out, telling him to drop off the rental car while he was in town. “Look alive, Captain!” He had bid him. Look alive, like he was putting on a raunchy radio performance for every man listening in to his chip.</p><p>Hans was sure every horny, starved vampire would be crowded around the monitoring station, listening in for everything going on. While the thought of him sharing a private view made his blood boil, he thought it somehow worse that she would never know she was being made into a show.</p><p>If he wouldn’t be punished for it, at this point, he would have ditched her for her sake. Now all he can do is go into it and give her whatever he can possibly offer. Hans is in enemy territory, pressured into awful decisions by the boss he can’t wait to lose in hell when he finally gets the chance.</p><p>So that’s how he finds himself in some miserable clothing store in the middle of fucking London, looking through button up shirts like the differences in pattern will mean anything when he’ll wear it only once to rail some stupid woman clean out of her mind. If this were 50 years ago or so he wouldn’t have even bothered with this, but it was part of the Major’s damnable command.</p><p>There were a lot of ifs, he realized; and where there was room for debate, Schrodinger would always insert himself. Damn it. As if summoned by magic, the catboy is suddenly humming at his side, pulling the sleeve of a different shirt of the same design.</p><p>“I thought you could use some help, Captain,” he says, “and based on what you’re looking at I’m right.”</p><p>Hans snorts, ambivalence unmovable on his face. Inside, he thinks of smacking the boy into tomorrow and showing up to dinner in his only casual wear. Schrodinger can feel it, judging by the shudder rolling up his skin and glimmer of fear in his eyes. “I’ll try to make it quick and painless,” he squeaks, as if anything he’s ever gotten involved with on this earth has been quick and painless.</p><p>A sudden premonition flits into Hans’ head, and he has only a moment to prepare himself for the next awful thing that will leave Schrodinger’s mouth. It’s a shame that when she says something too terribly stupid to even conceive, it’s funny; and when he does it, it’s torturous.</p><p>“I’ve already been through her room,” he says, “and I think you should lose the surplus military look and find something soft.” Hans heaves a sigh through his nose and fixes Schrodinger with the most exhausted gaze he can manage. The child will have to pry his tags from his cold, dead hands; but the look he’s getting promises exactly that.</p><p>He is far, far too old for this.</p><p>-16-</p><p>The Museum of Natural History was wonderful—although she caught herself wishing in the back of her mind that she had his company again. Dare she say it, but she’d want to yammer on, and on, and on about everything there from the shiny rocks to the dinosaur fossils. She’d have loved to suggest another silly thought, like asking which dinosaur he would’ve liked to ride around on. If she ever ended up with him. OR someone like him—goodness, she can’t catch feelings for a nameless one-time fling—she would have to take them through a natural history museum. And along for the nice lunch she had in the park. And then to wherever else she would wander, like Kew Gardens on her itinerary tomorrow.</p><p>She must be lonely, she thinks as she leaves the Natural History Museum at closing. It’s still bright out, but there are significantly larger crowds and she has to squeeze and push her way down to the subway and then onto the train. With one hand in her pocket, over her wallet, she has to bite back a wince when somebody’s hand must just accidentally brush up against her rear end.</p><p>She wriggles around as best she can to shift away from it, but at the next stop it happens again and her skin crawls the bad way. Glancing around frantically, she finally notices a sleazy man leering up at her from one of the precious few seats on the subway.</p><p>Her big guy was nice because he touched with permission. This man was gross because he violated her boundaries.</p><p>When he sees that she’s glaring down at him, grimace etched on her face, he blows a kiss and bats his eyelashes. She tears her gaze away and feels his hand on her again, this time lingering. Fighting the urge to make a scene and bowl down as many passengers as she can to get away, she grinds her teeth and bears it until the next stop, when she takes off like a bat out of hell and damn near mows down one person anyway.</p><p>Her heart stops in her chest when he slides off after her, leer on his face and hands casually stuck in his pocket. She takes off again, up the stairs at the end of the platform to street level. She has no idea where she is, not that it matters when she’s trying to bolt and when there are crowds so thick she can’t see through them anyway.</p><p>Pushing her way along, she’s miserable to find that he’s keeping up with her, following her across a damn street, even! And just when she’s about to run, he snags her wrist and pulls her towards an alley.</p><p>“Come here, doll,” he drawls, “you must be looking for a good time dressed like that.” The alley is greasy, dingey, and feels like years away from the bustling streets just two yards away. She pulls against his grip, back to the street and a scream catches in her throat. The somewhat low-cut shirt had been a bad idea.</p><p>He doubles his efforts, pulling her in before a rough hand grabs her other arm and hauls her away, pulling the creep clean off his feet. And standing at her side, having just released her arm with murder written all over his face, is none other than the mystery man himself. It hurts a bit, but she infinitely prefers that to the alternative.</p><p>-17-</p><p>He couldn’t believe it when he caught her scent over the bustling masses of people moving on the streets. But then he could, when he caught a glimpse of her rushing through the crowd only to be whisked away into an alley. Just his fucking luck.</p><p>Just her fucking luck, too, from the look of it.</p><p>Without really thinking he’d pushed and shoved his way through the streets over to where he thought he saw her disappear, quickly catching her scent again as he neared and following it to see some street thug with his hand on <em>his </em>woman.</p><p>Hans is going to put a quick fucking stop to that, blood damn near boiling. He hadn’t meant to use such force on her arm—probably bruised her and scared her further, the opposite of showing her a good time.</p><p>“What’s your fucking problem, mate?” the creep started in after catching his stumble, “Can’t you see she and I have shit to do?” He’s reaching for his back with one hand, probably for a useless gun or knife, and reaching back out towards the woman with the other. Hans is only going to give him a single chance to take a hike before he reduces the thug to a smear of red along the cobblestone floor of the alleyway.</p><p>Reaching in deep, trying to remember exactly how it worked, he finally rasped out a low, rough “fuck off.” His voice, unused for a solid 54 years and 36 days, had finally been used again. It was awful, dry and near incomprehensible—it’s a miracle it worked at all, coming from vocal chords that’d been so damn scrambled by the silver prongs pressed into his larynx for the Major’s “electrical training device” back when he’d been a more <em>wild</em> new recruit into the unit.</p><p>A ghost of the memory of his pain passes through him and his snarl twists deeper into his face, brows dropping lower and eyes glowering menacingly at the street thug who, in a twist of sheer genius, actually does pull a gun from the back of his pants.</p><p>Hans wastes no time jerking the poor, now confused, woman around again putting her bodily behind him before bringing his leg up in one devastating kick that audibly cracks the other man’s bones. Before he’d even had the chance to fire, Hans broke at least 4 of his ribs and sent him flying further down the alleyway where he fell onto his back and stayed, wheezing as he struggled to breathe. That wouldn’t be lasting for long.</p><p>The catharsis in that one kick shot through Hans like a silver arrow, carrying a release of <em>something</em> he hasn’t felt in years.</p><p>-18-</p><p>He’d showed up like a literal knight in shining armor and [NAME] could only bring herself to grasp loosely at the back of his shirt, trying to take deep breaths now that he seemed to have the situation under control. At least that’s what that hollow thud and cracking had sounded like, anyway. She didn’t want to look; didn’t want to know. The creep deserved whatever he got and, speaking honestly, [NAME] wasn’t surprised by her hero’s strength in the slightest.</p><p>But she couldn’t calm down. Not really with what had just gone down when nobody in the main street seemed to have noticed. Taking stuttering deep breaths, she tightens her grip and tries to blink away the tears gathering in her eyes. It’s a futile effort as her vision just keeps blurring and her breathing turns into quiet, shallow sobbing, pitifully gasping for air while holding onto the back of his shirt like her life depended on it.</p><p>She jumps when his shirt falls, solely held by her hands and losing the remainder of its stored heat to atmosphere. Mercy, the heat he’d been radiating was so comforting and tangible she only noticed it was gone because she’d missed it.</p><p>A particularly loud sob forces its way out of her and she brings his shirt to her face, shamelessly pressing it to her cheeks like she could hide her face and shame from the world. She takes a half step forward in a half-hearted attempt to find him once more when one of his hands lightly comes down on the top of her head, gently patting her twice. She shudders at the contact and loosens her grip on the shirt, almost panicking again when it’s quickly taken from her only to calm down once more when it’s draped over her shoulders.</p><p>Mercy, it’s a button-up. It means he’s changed since the morning.</p><p>Her hands fly up to the collar and she pulls it tightly around herself like it’ll shield her from the world. Furiously trying to blink more tears out of her eyes she finally looks and sees him, in all his blurry shirtless glory, standing awkwardly in front of her.</p><p>Heaving another sob she takes a full step into him, pressing up to his reassuringly warm chest as close she can. Seeming to take the hint, he finally wraps his arms around her and holds her there, letting her take her time to calm down.</p><p>-19-</p><p>He’d really preferred it when she’d been pressed into his chest back at the museum. He knew what to do there—it was easy and animal: touch the right places and take a few kisses and let her melt to putty under his hands. This whole sobbing and comfort thing was another story. The best he could think to do was shed his new shirt to throw over her blessedly low-cut top so she could cover herself. It was embarrassing to think that she’d had to guide him into giving her a hug and even more embarrassing that he had to stand there, holding her while she sobbed with a crowd of people walking along on the nearby street and a crowd of monsters listening in around the world.</p><p>She was nothing but trouble; that much was certain.</p><p>At last the man’s wheezing had shifted to something like gurgling and then come to a desperate stop altogether; and at least she hadn’t noticed when it did. Hans makes the mistake of looking down and registering that he likes the way his shirt looks over her shoulders while she desperately seeks his stiff comfort. It makes him feel like she was actually his for a moment: his to hold and cherish.</p><p><em>To cherish. </em>What a pitiful, human emotion. Something that most monsters did well to cast out as quickly as they could. Nothing more than a burden; it brings only trouble. In his damnable pursuit to <em>cherish</em> he’s in the middle of enemy territory holding a woman he met that morning and will only know through the night all for what?</p><p>She sobs loudly again, and he gives her a gentle squeeze, hating how genuinely he wished to make her to stop crying.</p><p>She is nothing more than a conquest for the night. Entertainment for him and the boys and that would be that. He hated the way the taste didn’t sit right on his tongue or how he undoubtedly knew he’d be left craving the feeling of her body against his until the day he died. Of her stupid commentary and big, sweet eyes. Of her pitifully expressive cheeks broadcasting how easily riled up she was.</p><p>In too deep far too fast for too little time. He’d known her <em>for an hour</em>.</p><p>He’d need a new shirt, too. He’d be damned if he took that back from her when she looked that criminally good in it and tickled his possessive side that never got a chance to come out.</p><p>Heaving a sigh, Hans moves his hands to her arms and pulls her just the tiniest bit away from himself. He curses how his throat catches when she turns her wide eyes and tear stained cheeks up at him, silently asking what he’d doing. Dropping his hands from her arms down to the bottom corners of her new shirt, he leans down to press a pitiful kiss to her forehead, doing up the buttons at inhuman speed. If the Major had known that the only incentive he’d needed to behave was a voluptuous emotional woman by his side, it would’ve saved them both a lot of difficulty.</p><p>-20-</p><p>His gesture is sweet, she thinks just as he finishes doing up the buttons lightning quick, wrapping her in his shirt like a panicked cat in a blanket. In spite of her wet sobs she chokes out a laugh, wriggling in his loose shirt until she slides her arms through the all-too-big sleeves. He’s got a surprisingly soft flannel shirt that he’s just sacrificed to her until further notice.</p><p>She brings a sleeve up to wipe the tears out of her eyes and feels her breathing start to go back to normal as he leans down to kiss the top of her head, almost as if he could never steal too many kisses. He must really be trying to lay on all the moves.</p><p>“How are we going to go to dinner if you don’t have a shirt, big guy?” she asks, voice wavering as the urges to cry and laugh both tussle within. He shrugs in response, the wet patch where her face had been glistening faintly in the lesser relative light of the alley and drawing her eyes to his extremely impressive rack. “I won’t be able to focus on anything else,” she mumbles quietly, mostly as a very embarrassing afterthought with surprisingly little tremble to her voice.</p><p>He huffs at that, mouth flat but eyebrows raised. At the very least he’s amused. Instead of giving her a chance to ramble on he offers his (impressive) arm to her, elbow first for her to take.</p><p>Forcing her eyes back up to his face she beams a still very wet smile up to him and slides over to his side, slipping her arm through his and following the pace he sets as they exit the alleyway together. She doesn’t look back. Doesn’t want to see: doesn’t want to know.</p><p>The people on the street give them wide berth, muttering to themselves about the (absolutely shredded) suspicious shirtless guy walking arm-in-arm with a teary-eyed woman, completely unknowing that he was superior in every way to the distant British gentleman and not in fact the fool that had gone and made her cry in the first place.</p><p>She follows him, basking in his indifferent confidence as the crowds part for his intimidating figure and he heads for one of many clothing stores lining the busy shopping district. [NAME] only noticed as she looked around that every building on the street was home to a storefront; most for clothes but some for shoes and makeup as well. If she had the time it might be fun to go window shopping down here.</p><p>He guides her into a sizeable, multi-floor department store, passing by a very owlish doorman who bids them a hesitant welcome. She smiles anxiously at him as they pass, hoping that they won’t be booted out until she realizes that very few people are likely to approach a shirtless Adonis with a perpetually blank, passively unimpressed face.</p><p><em>He really is something</em>, she decides when he leads her past rack after rack over to a section full of ugly, long-sleeved mustard yellow button up shirts like he knew they were there before he brought her by. Snuggling deeper into his flannel—it smelled very faintly of something woodsy and musky, and it made her insides heat up and her heart beat a little harder—she reached for the ugliest shirt on the rack.</p><p>-21-</p><p>Hans pretends to not notice when she nuzzles into his shirt and takes a whiff. He really doesn’t need to feel his cold and mostly frozen heart swelling any more; he’ll need his wits about himself in this damnable mess.</p><p>At least she’s handy as she holds up the sleeve of the shirt he’d been looking at before Schrodinger intervened and forced him into the flannel and jeans.</p><p>“This looks like your speed, big guy,” she says, side eyeing him with a twinkle of mischievous judgement. There’s a mutual understanding that, while she doesn’t like it much, it’ll be on the floor by the end of the night anyway. Good thing that mutual plan was still on. Instead of providing her any response, he just finds one his size on the rack and shrugs it on, buttoning it up at an artificially slow pace just to prolong the time which his companion spends not-so-subtly staring at his exposed chest as its swallowed up by the shirt.</p><p>He’s supposed to be the animal, but she looks like the one about to start drooling.</p><p>As soon as the show is over she reaches out to grab his arm again, settling her hand on his elbow and pulling him in the direction of the cash register. It goes without saying that she’s getting hungry when her stomach rumbles just loudly enough for him to hear. Since she ignores it, he does too; and together they make their way over to the nearest lineless cash register. Wordlessly, he forks over his arm where the price tag dangles from the cuff around his wrist.</p><p>His companion remains firmly planted to his other arm, eyes fixating on the material drawn taut against his upper arm. It’s the biggest size they were carrying, but he’s still fairly certain that the sleeve would burst if he flexed. That might be worth trying tonight just to see her reaction.</p><p>The cashier must recognize him from before, pinning him with a long-suffering gaze, and just scans the dangling tag before spitting out the total. Fishing the wad of bills from his pocket with his free hand, Hans flicks out 3 of the remaining £20 bills and drops them on the counter. That done, he repockets the money and brings his wrist up to his mouth where he snaps off the tag with a single bite.</p><p>The woman on his arm raises an eyebrow at him, quietly judging him with a crooked smirk when he leads her away from the poor soul that just pockets his change in mutual understanding that, much like earlier in the afternoon, he doesn’t care. The tag flutters to the floor for some other overworked soul to take care of.</p><p>-22-</p><p>“You’re quite the high roller, big guy,” [NAME] sing-songs to him as they exit onto the street, resting her head on his upper arm and laughing quietly to herself as he grunts in response. “Do you still want dinner where I suggested?” For a moment she wonders if he’s used to the finer things in life, but then she reassures herself that, based on his dress this morning, he’s probably just trying to show off.</p><p>She’s also pleased to find that instead of jolting her head by shrugging, he grunts another affirmative as he steers their wide footprint through the crowd packing the streets. They make their way back to a subway entrance where, after a moment of hesitation on [NAME]’s end, she takes the initiative and descends into the tube, the big guy following her pace.</p><p>Finding where they are and procuring a couple of tickets back to [NAME]’s original destination is a breeze and they’re soon standing side to side on the subway platform with a crush of other people waiting for the next train. She glances around cautiously to ensure that the surrounding individuals at least look somewhat trustworthy before settling her nerves enough to close her eyes and focus on the feeling of the muscular arm under her hand, daydreaming to herself about what on earth he does to maintain these guns.</p><p>He must have a ridiculous workout, she thinks, evidenced how he effortlessly held her against the wall earlier in the day. How long could he hold her up for? Could he carry her on his shoulders, up and away from the crowds that were starting to get to her?</p><p>…could he hold her on his shoulders against the wall while he ate her out like a starving man finally given food? A flush explodes across her face and she turns her head into his arm. Instead of calming down when she makes the promise to herself to find out that evening, she inhales and finds that the woodsy, musky smell on his shirt is much stronger on his person and it sends a shock of warmth right down to her core. Cursing internally, she rubs her thighs together and he snorts at her fidgeting, somehow immediately understanding what was going on.</p><p>She pulled her head from his arm to stick her tongue out at him just as the train pulls in. He looks back down at her and something dark and alluring passes through his reddish eyes, the only indication that he was going to make her put that tongue to good use later. Before she can think too hard on it, the train doors open and he pulls her in, directing her across the carriage to the door on the opposite side.</p><p>-23-</p><p>Hans makes sure to get her in a corner and take a defensive position between her and the rest of the car. She seemed to draw a lot of trouble, he noticed, between both himself and the lowly street thug in the same day.</p><p>He looks to the ceiling as people push in behind him, packing themselves in like sardines in a can. The woman on his arm hums, pulling him closer so she could rest her head on his chest as the doors closed and some magical overhead voice announced the next stop.</p><p>It wasn’t theirs.</p><p>Which was good, he supposed, because he could stand with her cornered, head to his chest while she clearly struggled with some inner decision to just take him home for the night and fuck him or stick to the original plan and start with dinner. At least that’s what he picked up on, between the scent of her starting to get hot and bothered again and her general clinginess. Either way he didn’t care: he was still balls deep in enemy territory so he could be balls deep in a pretty woman by the end of the night.</p><p>It wasn’t his problem until she turned her eyes up to him and cracked a toothy smile. “Thanks, big guy, I could really use a travelling mate like you, you know.”</p><p>He could feel his heart beat a little faster, a little harder, and knew that every fucking vampire from Rio de Janeiro to Moscow would be howling at how his body reacted against his will for some human woman. Even worse was that a traitorous part of his mind considered it for a moment: just take off with her and never look back; put off his retirement for a little longer to chase pleasure. He could only bring himself to grunt in response and break eye contact, looking over her head and out the window of the door behind her.</p><p>He could feel her embarrassed smile pressed into his chest, suggesting that she was surprised that she even brought it up to him. And how he <em>wished</em> it was some silly, one-time sentiment and not some pathetic attachment that had been building since he slid up to her side in the museum that morning. For having met so recently it was ridiculous that either of them feel this strongly.</p><p>-24-</p><p>The next stop came and went; the PA announced that their stop was next. [NAME] could feel the butterflies start to take flight in her stomach. Sure he wasn’t very vocal—and apparently when he did speak it sounded physically painful—but his company was endearing for reasons far beyond her grasp. And his company tonight, above all else, felt like it would clearly define something in her life.</p><p>She certainly hoped that didn’t mean she would never get over this fling.</p><p>Tightening her grip on his arm to ground herself against him, she resolves that it’ll be a one-night ordeal. Sure it will be romantic and his body will forever ruin her standards but there’s got to be something wrong with him beyond his sense of style. Maybe it’ll be that he treats service workers awfully, like he kind of did back at the store. Or maybe he’s only got that wad of cash to his name and has no stable income. Or maybe it’ll have to do with the creep he kicked in the alleyway that didn’t get back up.</p><p>Either way, she can find <em>something</em> wrong with him and hang onto that as a means to not fall in love and ruin her damn trip over a two-part dick appointment.</p><p>When the subway train finally makes it to their stop, her man easily cuts his way through the crowds to the surface streets. It’s significantly less crowded in this location as compared to the shopping district, and it’s easy enough for her to find a street sign she recognizes.</p><p>Once she starts to pull in the direction of the <em>Bulldog’s House</em>, her companion follows along, letting his eyes wander and take in the surroundings. It’s a short walk to the pub and, since they had just started serving dinner, they’re seated inside without much fuss or wait. He’d even nodded politely in greeting to the waiter, an improvement over his treatment of the cashier in the department store.</p><p>They’d been seated in a dimly lit corner, given two menus, and promptly been left alone. Scratching behind her head nervously, [NAME] laughs lightly. “At least we’ll get some privacy tonight,” she says winking at the attractive man across the table.  He only looks at her for a moment more before grunting and reaching for the menu.</p><p>-25-</p><p>Hans’ skin crawls when he sits down at the table. He can smell and practically feel the silverware from his seat. Actual silverware; the first time he’s been allowed near silver in decades. His companion may be a nervous wreck as the weight of the night sets in, but his mind has narrowed down to a single track and all he can do is grunt at her and grab his menu, figuring out how he’ll pick up the silver without providing a dead giveaway to the live audience that he’s got a forbidden substance.</p><p>Counting his breaths and focusing on keeping his heart rate even, he sneaks a glance at his cutlery: a single fork and knife protruding from a nicely folded black napkin. He can work with that.</p><p>When the woman across the table from him reluctantly picks up her own menu and starts going through it, he shifts his menu to one hand and casually, with as little motion and noise as possible, grabs his cutlery and removes it from the table, bringing it down onto his lap.</p><p>The waiter comes back over with two glasses and a pitcher of water. “Good evening,” he bids, “can I interest the young couple in anything else to drink?” Hans spares him one glance before the realization hits him. He can have a proper fucking beer tonight for the first time since the Major had insisted on upgrading the chips to measure for blood alcohol content. God forbid Hans find a speck of joy in his shitty life.</p><p>Leaving the silverware balanced on one knee under the table, he flips through the menu to find a drink list of some kind. His reading comprehension wasn’t as rusty as his writing, which was still better than his speech, at least. “Can I get a [DRINK]?” his companion asks. Hans finds the drink list just as the server replies “Of course.”</p><p>Before he can even be asked, Hans flips the menu to face the server and points at the most German looking beer name he can find. The man nods solemnly, “Good choice, sir. I’ll have those over soon.” He takes his leave and Hans looks across the table where his companion buries herself in the menu again.</p><p>Taking that as his cue to sneak over somewhere private, a bathroom, maybe, he stands. Her head flies up and she looks at him, not uttering a word as he departs. He can feel her anxious, questioning stare on his back until he sees the bathroom and finally leaves her view.</p><p>-26-</p><p>[NAME]’s heart stops when her date for the evening stands abruptly. He’d been off since they sat down, refusing to look at her and just getting lost in the menu. Hopefully it was just something weird—like he needed to pee, because he did head for the bathroom—and not that he had no idea how to read.</p><p>Pausing and reflecting for a minute, she finally decides that it probably wouldn’t matter if he couldn’t read. That would just be another little note for her to add to her cons list when she internally compares his pros vs cons. It would also explain why he’d been so confused watching as she used an automated machine to order and process their subway tickets.</p><p>Did he even know what he ordered to drink? She flipped to the back of the menu to go through the drinks, scanning the long list of beers until she settled on what she thinks he ordered. The name looked German. Shouldn’t he try something local like a Guinness? She was no beer connoisseur but the point stands. Fresh beer is better than canned, but all beer tastes like piss and that was that.</p><p>Was it socially acceptable to demand somebody use mouthwash before they kissed you? Especially when it was a one-time affair?</p><p>The waiter returns with their drinks and sets them down at the table. “I’ll give you a bit longer with the menus so your boyfriend can get back, but did you want me to bring any starters out for you?” [NAME] pauses for a moment, light blush spreading over her cheeks at the idea of her nameless date being taken as her boyfriend.</p><p>“Can you bring us some of the pretzels and cheese?” she asks, mind immediately spitting out the first thing she recalled from the appetizer list. The waiter nods and takes his leave once more, leaving [NAME] alone to her nervous thoughts until her date returns, face expressionless.</p><p>-27-</p><p>“You must have really had to pee, huh?” his company asks, eyebrows knit together and mouth stuck in an infuriatingly cute pout. He didn’t, but he nods. It’s better than her realizing he’d stabbed himself with the silver-plated butter knife he’d been left on the table. Hopefully nobody had been able to see it coming before he had the knife hilt deep into the junction between his neck and shoulder. Hell, he’d even gone through the unpleasant effort of digging out the freshly halved chip using the knife and fork like a pair of tongs just in case they could still track him.</p><p>The remains of the chip were crushed and disposed of with the silverware and his pager into the sea of paper towels in the garbage pail. The napkin was currently beneath his shirt, neatly squared away over the wound so it wouldn’t bleed through. His companion’s eyes briefly fall on the faint outline of the makeshift gauze, but she doesn’t comment.</p><p>At least the searing on his fingers from touching the silver was mostly healed.</p><p>They fall into an awkward silence and Hans picks up his menu again, mentally calculating that he had an hour and a half before the Major could get his pudgy ass from the airstrip back into London. As long as they could leave and get to somewhere other than the <em>Something Victoria</em> hotel his date had suggested, they’d be golden for an uninterrupted private evening.</p><p>The thought of privacy for the first time in years makes Hans’ heart beat a little faster.</p><p>“So, uh,” his lovely woman starts, picking up her menu, “am I going to get your name some time tonight, big guy? Or am I going to have to guess what name I’ll be screaming later?”</p><p>Hans grunts for a moment and wonders how to express his name, setting his menu down again to meet her gaze, face half hidden behind her menu like a shield. She looks almost hurt that he’d left without explanation or warning, even though he didn’t have the time or words to explain it. “If it helps,” she continues weakly, “my name is [NAME].”</p><p>It’s a sweet name, he thinks. Deep down he’s glad that he dug the chip out before hearing it, because that meant he was already seeing more of her than any other monster would that night. He’ll have to figure out how to reply to her without speaking, just like he’ll have to figure out a way to trick the fae magic binding him to the Major’s verbal orders come morning if he wants to stay longer.</p><p>He’s a crafty bastard—he’ll figure it out, especially if he wants to avoid the public flagellation for being marked as a disobedient scoundrel. Too precious to get rid of as a deserter, but not too delicate to punish with brimstone and hellfire.</p><p>Finally thinking of something, he holds out a hand to her. In response her eyebrows furrow more, but she reluctantly sets down the menu and places her hand, palm down, on his. Hans tries to ignore how <em>[NAME]</em>’s touch feels electric when he gently flips her hand and then presses his other index finger to her palm, carefully drawing out an H, A, N, and S.</p><p>Not content to just let her have her hand back once he’s done, Hans ducks down and brings her palm to his lips, giving it a soft kiss.</p><p>Hook, line, and sinker she falls for it, taking the bait and blushing a nice, ruby red for him. “You tease!” [NAME] squeaks. In response his indifference shifts and he cracks a small, smartass smirk in her direction. He’s feeling more and more like his old self the longer he spends with her. Maybe something about her magnetic pull for trouble is good.</p><p>-28-</p><p>[NAME] can feel the blush settling right at home on her cheeks as she snatches back her hand, heart damn near stopping in her chest at the sight of the smirk he gives her. It looks more fitting on his face—Hans’ face—than his indifference, she thinks. Instead of giving him the satisfaction of seeing her blush, she pulls her menu back up as a shield, half scanning the menu and half glancing up at him to make sure he isn’t up to any more funny business.</p><p>Fortunately or unfortunately, he only shakes his head and grabs his beer, taking a long swig like it was a favorite drink he hadn’t had in ages. The waiter chooses that moment to make an appearance, coming back with a plate piled with large, warm pretzels and cheese dip.</p><p>Fighting the urge to dive in like a starving vulture, [NAME] thanks the waiter who, upon seeing Hans drain his beer in one go—[NAME] hadn’t realized he’d been <em>that</em> thirsty—offers to grab another. He nods, offering his pint glass back to the waiter.</p><p>“Have you had a moment to think over what you’d like to eat this evening?” the waiter asks, passing the pint glass back and forth between his hands. [NAME] looks over to Hans for confirmation since he’d really only had a few moments looking at the menu. When he nods, she nods as well. “Well then, what can I get for you, young lady?”</p><p>“I’d like some [FOOD], if you’d be so kind,” [NAME] replies to him, offering up her menu. Nodding along, the waiter takes it, relegating the pint glass to a single hand and the menu to the other. “A [FOOD] for the lady and, for the gentleman?”</p><p>Hans snorts silently at being called a gentleman before flipping open the menu and pointing at the entry for bangers and mash. The waiter nods to him and takes his menu in a show of understanding. “Good choices, all around,” he says, “I’ll put those in for you post haste.”</p><p>And like that, he wanders off, leaving [NAME] and Hans to their evening. The first thing [NAME] does is snatch a pretzel, dipping one edge into a generous amount of cheese. Hans follows suit, breaking off a piece of one of the two remaining warm morsels of bready and salty goodness before dipping it.</p><p>“Oh man these look good!” [NAME] exclaims before taking a massive bite out of the cheesy section. Although she tries her damnedest to be neat, she’d been hungry for the past hour and really couldn’t resist being a little messy. It was by design, after all, that some of the cheese smudged around the corners of her mouth and dripped down onto her chin.</p><p>She takes another bite, eyes flicking over to Hans, who seemed much more enraptured by her than the pretzel in his hands. He took a bite as a lustful, hungry look passed through his eyes as he focused on the food at her mouth.</p><p>Mission success.</p><p>-29-</p><p>He knew she was doing it to tease him; letting the cheese get everywhere while he fought the urge to kick the table to the side and lick all the sauce from her face like the dog he was. But then [NAME] went back in for another bite, humming contentedly as she further added to the mess and Hans was hit with the sudden need to know if she would find the same level of rapturous joy in taking him in, and whether she would be so messy drinking up what he gave her for the fruits of her labor.</p><p>He’d certainly love to see it; to feel it; to hear the way she may very well choke on him when he inevitably gets too rough.</p><p>For once he has to suppress a shudder as he pins her with the best warning look he can. If she teases him tonight they may not make it back to the hotel and she’ll have to settle for a midnight romp in the park. As if she can sense his thoughts she flushes and grabs the napkin from her lap to dab at her face, removing the inspiring cheese.</p><p>“Sorry for being a bit messy, Hans,” she says, muffled lightly by the napkin at her mouth, “but I was hungry.” Hearing his name fall from her lips is enough to send a shiver crawling along his skin and he grunts to let her know her apology is accepted. He wants to hear her say his name again, and again, and again until she’s used it enough to make up for all the times people have refused to call him anything more than a dog.</p><p>What will she sound like, crying his name desperately to the heavens? Whispering it in a plea only loud enough for him to hear? Right before she falls asleep when she thanks him for the best night of her life?</p><p>That knowledge would be his and his alone—he’s made sure of it. Not even Schrodinger, who would no doubt be desperately searching for him to tell him the Major’s next orders, would know. Somewhere in the back of his mind he wonders if the kid would be more pleasant with a proper, human parent?</p><p>Somebody capable of showing the love and affection monsters like him were incapable of understanding, let alone emulating for another. If he’d been raised properly, would Schrodinger be capable of the same? Would he leave them alone for the night out of respect rather than fear that Hans would tear into him like a hungry fox into a lone hen?</p><p>-30-</p><p>[NAME] finishes her pretzel, taking note of how Hans’ gaze seemed to grow more and more distant. Before she can speak up to ask him what’s wrong, the waiter swings by with another beer. “Here you go, sir,” he says, dropping off Hans’ drink and carting away three more full beers on a tray bound for another table. Shaking off whatever had him down, Hans grabs his new beer and takes a fresh, normal sized sip.</p><p>It’s quiet now; awkward, unlike their previous silences were. Earlier in the day she’d just bask in his warmth like he was a star hidden inside the clay shell of a man’s body but now it seemed his heat was dying out. So she does exactly what comes best.</p><p>“Hey, Hans,” she whispers conspiratorially across the table, leaning closer to invite him into a conversation to be kept secret from the other restaurant patrons, “how many bites do you think it would take you to finish that pretzel?” She points to the pretzel he’d taken a chunk of on the tray and his stare moves to follow her finger, bored eyes evaluating the pretzel as a front for his mind no doubt wondering why she would ask something so inane.</p><p>After a moment of thought he holds up two fingers and [NAME]’s eyes narrow in challenge. “Bet? I want to see it happen, big guy,” she murmurs, smile cracking over her face as she bats her eyelashes at him. “If you can do it, I’ll give you a kiss.”</p><p>She says this with as much conviction as she can, as if she wouldn’t be kissing him later like her life depended on it anyway. He narrows his eyes for a moment at her challenge before, surely enough, splitting what’s left in half and stuffing it into his mouth.</p><p>[NAME]’s hands fly to her mouth as she bites back the instinct to squeak in entertained delight. The muffled giggles that follow, though, spill out regardless of her efforts as Hans chews the significant bite he’s taken. She notes for a moment how he doesn’t struggle in the slightest, jaw strength out of this world and teasing as to what may very well come later in the evening if his tongue is even half as strong.</p><p>She feels herself blush, still quietly giggling when he swallows and grabs the other portion, dunking it in the cheese dip for good measure. Taking the time it takes for him to stuff the other half of the pretzel in his mouth, [NAME] notes that, while his eyes still hold something exhausted, he doesn’t look quite so forlorn. Mission accomplished.</p><p>Once he’s finished the whole thing, in only the span of a few minutes, he sets one confident elbow on the table and leans over the middle, staring at her with challenge written in the same cocky smirk he was wearing earlier. Fulfilling her promise, she half-stands from her chair and takes his face in her hands, giving his nose the smallest of kisses before letting go and sitting down.</p><p>His smirk falls and he shoots her a betrayed look; she just returns it with a cheeky smile of her own.</p><p>-31-</p><p>She was certainly something, he admitted to himself. Whether she wanted to keep the mood light for her own enjoyment or, heaven forbid, his sake it was much appreciated. He would, however, pay her back in spades for that coy act.</p><p>And no sooner than they settle down back into their pleasant airs, [NAME] starts in on talking about what she did after they split to fill in the silence—she went to the local natural history museum and spent a few hours staring at rocks and fossils. If staring at ancient fossils was an ideal way for her to spend the day, she may very well appreciate his naked form. Thinking this, he cracks another small smile for her, chin resting in the palm of his hand.</p><p>Her stutter when she realizes that this gesture was for her is something Hans is sure he will savor for years to come. He spends the time she chatters nursing his beer and burning the night into his head. It <em>is</em> a once in a lifetime event, after all.</p><p>The waiter eventually does bring their food out along with an extra set of silverware for Hans. In return he carts away the last, untouched pretzel. Unlike the last set, this set was not silver plated. The sheer fortune that he had managed to get silverware in this space hits him, now, and before he eats, he spares a thankful thought to Schrodinger, a surprisingly competent wingman after all.</p><p>[NAME]’s chatter is broken up between bites of her meal as she tries to both enjoy what she’s eating and make the most of his company. She’s since moved from talking about dinosaur fossils to technological fossils, telling him of her plans to take a day trip away from London to visit some computer museum. Hans just keeps eating at his slow and steady pace, making peace with the fact he had lived long enough and actually used some models or variants of the computers she was talking about.</p><p>The weight of her youth would crush an old man like him.</p><p>She freezes in the middle of some lengthy description of ferrite core memory, like he hadn’t actually used it, and quickly changes subjects. “How’s your meal, big guy?” she starts, “Sorry if this nerd stuff isn’t your thing.”</p><p>[NAME] averts her gaze when he looks up from his food and it hits him that he didn’t care if he was disinterested in it, he just wanted her to keep talking to him. Or, better yet, he could tell her all about it. If he could speak. There might be a slight hitch there, but with enough patience on both sides he could write something interesting and lengthy about it.</p><p>He realized he hadn’t yet responded when she starts to fidget, and he quickly shrugs his shoulders. These sausages were no bratwurst, but they were still miles better than his usual rations. Her shoulders sink at his response and he’s left reevaluating his approach. That may not have been the best response.</p><p>-32-</p><p>First she’d been rambling at him and then he wasn’t even enjoying his food that much. Was her company really that bad? Sure, she was insecure and had a tendency to share just a little too much at once, but it was all in the name of appreciation.</p><p>She can’t even bring herself to look him in the eyes again until she feels his boot lightly tap her foot under the table. And when she does finally turn her gaze up to him, she almost bursts into flames at the sight. He’s got his fork, extended for her to take, with a helping of both sausage and potato.</p><p>She knows he means <em>take it and try it</em>, but something about his more relaxed stare with his standard flat frown sparks a bit of extra courage in her and, with blood rushing to her cheeks, she leans forward to take the bite as he holds it out.</p><p>Hans’ eyes widen for just a second, gone as soon as it’s there, but she saw. And her heart beats awkwardly as she pulls away and she gets it. It’s good as far as pub food goes, but her meal is better. Without sparing a second thought, she gets a forkful of her own and offers it in return, face still aflame. He doesn’t even hesitate when he goes in to try her [FOOD], just ducks his head and snatches it off her fork like she would’ve retracted her offer if she thought more about it.</p><p>When he pulls back, she imagines for just a moment that she sees longing flash through his eyes, and she almost sputters when she next speaks up. “I get what you mean—is mine any better?”</p><p>He nods, frown lightening slightly and shoulders relaxing, subconsciously inspiring her to perk back up. “Good to know,” she sighs, “I’m sure I can give you something that beats both of them tonight, though.” She finishes it with a wink but damn near bites herself at the overly confident tongue in cheek comment she made.</p><p>Hans seems to appreciate that, small smirk rising onto his face once more accompanied with a challenging quirk of his eyebrow. Instead of rising to it and further aggravating the blush on her face, [NAME] takes another bite of her food and the pair slip into silence until their plates are empty.</p><p>-33-</p><p>Hans can’t remember the last time dinner took him so long to eat. Hell, he’d even stay for dessert for the chance to be fed so intimately again if he wasn’t sure that the Major would be here and ready to skewer him by then. But having taken so long to eat was already a risk, so he flags down their waiter and mimes an open book for the bill.</p><p>[NAME] slouches in her chair, smiling at him and patting her belly and sighing in contentment after stuffing herself with good food. “Let me know how much it is, big guy,” she grumbles, “and I’ll fork over my half.”</p><p>In response, Hans snorts and shakes his head firmly. He didn’t give much a shit what year it was, or whether it would feed into her having a good night: he was paying, and that was final. The remaining currency he had wasn’t really even his, so what did it matter? She pinned him with a weird look of her own but, instead of pushing it, just turned her face to the ceiling, stretched, and pushed out a mix between a mewl and a yawn.</p><p>Hans decides he couldn’t let her criminal behavior go unpunished when she subtly cuddled into his flannel not a moment later. They were getting too close to the precipice of whatever was awaiting that night, and he was anxious to just get there.</p><p>The waiter takes his sweet damn time bringing them the check, but Hans just slips in £60 when he gets it to them and stands to leave, offering a Hans to [NAME] to get her going. She readily takes his hand, letting him pull her to her feet, and then doesn’t let go until they’re out the door and she has to reorient herself to find either her hotel or the subway.</p><p>“We have to take the subway to get to my hotel again,” she says, “but it shouldn’t take too long!” She reaches out for his hand again once she has her bearings, but he surprises her by wrapping an arm around her shoulders, justifying to himself that it would be easier to grab her and go if he had to. Until they were safely off the streets, they were in enemy territory with aggressive allies.</p><p>Hans has to keep himself from jumping when she wraps her arm around him during their walk to the nearest subway entrance, casually sliding her hand into his back pocket with an innocent smile on her face. She just keeps adding to her tab.</p><p>Getting to and on the subway was graciously easy. The carriages were full of relatively few people compared to earlier in the day, but both Hans and [NAME] remained standing. Hans to guard against threats and [NAME] likely because she wanted to keep feeling his ass through his jeans. She was even cocky enough to steal a light squeeze when the train had a particularly hard stop.</p><p>But when all is said and done, the last thing Hans had expected for her hotel was a <em>Ritz Carlton</em>; a posh brand the Major insisted on staying in when they’d had small, rare foreign outings longer than a single evening. She was a rich kid, which explained her positively bizarre personality and that she clearly had no idea how to handle herself on the street. He’s thankful that, as a spoiled rich kid, she didn’t grow into the same monster as the Major.</p><p>“Hopefully this is, uh, acceptable,” she squeaks to Hans, stealing a glance at his face to see that his eyes are hard and his jaw is set at an angle. Acceptable is one way to put it, he thinks, when the style is some kind of opulent baroque that he thought went out of style a century ago.</p><p>He was going to make sure she was loud enough to offend the other patrons.</p><p>-34-</p><p>[NAME] wilts a bit at his side, pulling her hand from his back pocket and keeping her eyes on the ornate carpet under their feet. The crystal chandeliers over their heads showered her in piercing light that highlighted how out of place her guest was compared to her. Although the carefully placed hotel staff eyed her date cautiously, she guided him through the grand main entrance, past the darling tea room, and over to the elevators. At least they knew her by face already and wouldn’t disturb her for her company. Once they’re mostly out of earshot of the other, clearly wealthy patrons, she speaks up again.</p><p>“My parents said they wouldn’t help me with my trip unless I went with their <em>trustworthy accommodations</em>. Hopefully I don’t come off as too, uh, stuck up.”</p><p>Hans grunts and squeezes her shoulder gently, turning his head to her and flashing a dangerous cocky smile. As if sensing his intent, a blush crept its way up onto her face and she pushed the elevator button with excessive force, begging that nobody else showed up to ride it with them.</p><p>Prayers answered, the elevator shows up without another soul in sight and [NAME] boards it, pressing the button for her floor and feeling her face heat up when Hans’ hand casually drops from her shoulder to her rear end. Yes, she probably deserved this for her behavior in the street, but there was a camera watching their every move!</p><p>He gives her rear end a slow, gentle squeeze, keeping his eyes straight ahead and mouth flat. She fights her instinct to shudder and grabs a fistful of his ugly shirt, hanging onto him for dear life as the elevator ascends at the speed of molasses. Deep down, she knows that as soon as they’re out of the elevator and in the hallway it’s game over, and he’ll spread himself all over her like butter on toast. The thought is exciting and damning.</p><p>She barely registers when the elevator stops and dings over the pounding of her heart in her ears. Her date finally releases his hold on her butt and guides her out the door once it’s fully opened, barely giving her a chance to start pulling in the direction of her hotel room before he moves his hand up and starts toying with the hem of her shirt.</p><p>Halfway down the hall he gets impatient and falls into step behind her. She can feel his hungry eyes burning into her hips as they walk.</p><p>She reaches the door to her room quickly, grateful that he hadn’t tried anything too extreme yet. But then she sticks her hand into her pocket for her wallet with her hotel key and he presses himself against her, holding her in place. Fumbling to pull her wallet from her pocket, she slams her eyes shut and whimpers when he drops his hands hot and heavy on her hips, slowly dragging them up until he cups her breasts, quiet, dark chuckle filling her head with cotton candy.</p><p> </p><p>She swallows thickly when she feels him growing hard against her back end, knowing that she was going to get exactly what she’d been asking for all day very soon. His hot breath spreads across the back of her neck and he gently squeezes her breasts, growing impatient as she finally reopens her eyes to thumb through her wallet to find the stupid magnetic card keeping her out of her room.</p><p>-35-</p><p>Hans kicks himself for not feeling up her breasts that morning. Too soft. Too easy, too. He nudges the back of her neck with the key he’d snatched not a moment ago held firmly between his teeth and she twists around in his arms, face gradually reddening. “When did you get that?” she squeaks, reaching up to grab it from him.</p><p>The second she pulls the card from his teeth he descends upon her, pressing kiss after searing kiss to her lips. He’s pleased to find she still tastes good. She struggles briefly, hand and key searching for the door lock before Hans finally loses patience and decides to have some mercy on her, positioning her hand to finally swipe the key and get them inside.</p><p>[NAME] finally opens the door and they stumble inside, Hans practically kicking the door closed and flipping the regular lock and fixing the chain lock for extra insurance against distractions. She flicks the lights on and catches her breath from his brief attack in the hall.</p><p>They pause for a moment, staring eye to eye before [NAME] breaks the silence. “Hans,” she says, voice wavering, “I want you to fuck me until I’m incoherent. Rail me on the bed—against the wall—in the bathtub—I don’t care. I want you <em>to fill me until I burst</em> and I don’t want to be able to walk tomorrow.”</p><p>This was <em>much</em> better than what was promised earlier. Hans takes a deep breath, relishing the scent of her arousal beginning to seep into the air. “Hans?” she asks more weakly before he all but loses himself, stealing another kiss and feeling her up and down: hands squeezing her breasts, her hips, her ass; hands pulling and holding her close while she shivers in his grasp, desperately kissing him back and trying to keep up with his hands which, with no doubt, must feel like they’re everywhere at once.</p><p>Forcefully calming himself, Hans takes her lower lip between his teeth, sucking lightly as he finally starts to unbutton his flannel she’d been wearing all night. It would be a shame to see it go, like pretty wrapping paper on a present, but the real treat was the gift hidden inside. She brings her hands up to his face, caressing his cheeks as he furiously fumbles with the buttons, debating whether it was worth the effort or if he should just violently rip the shirt off.</p><p>But then she hums and pulls herself away, butting her forehead against his. “What happened to the Hans this afternoon that could do buttons up in a flash?” she teases, eyes shining. He huffs in response, deciding to simply rip the remaining buttons open as he pulls and exposes her low cut top with very little of his actual strength.</p><p>She squeaks in delight and sheds the shirt from her arms before he can mutilate it further, drawing back a few steps closer to the bed. He prowls closer like he’s on a hunt and dives in to take another kiss, which she meets with an excited fervor of her own, tongue to tongue. He growls in warning when her hands dip low on his pelvis searching for the ends of his shirt and she gasps into him, fumbling with his buttons, now.</p><p>-36-</p><p>There wasn’t much room for talking or biding time as she struggled with the buttons on his shirt, but he didn’t seem to mind as long as he was preoccupied by his possessive kisses and his grip on her hips. He pushed her back another step towards the bed and she kicked her shoes off, freeing him of a few more buttons before he picked her up and threw her onto the bed.</p><p>She didn’t even have time to cry out in shock before he was back on her, his buff arms forming a cage around her while he took kiss after kiss. Without thinking much about it she threw her legs around him, urging him down to grind against her. He delivered, sure enough, and started rutting against her, hips snapping to meet hips with a delicious amount of friction.</p><p>“Hans,” she gasps between kisses, “<em>please.</em>” And although she doesn’t even know what she’s asking for he keeps moving, pulling his kisses away from her lips and gradually down her jaw, leaving a warm trail of fuzzies. He starts down her neck by the time her head lazily supplies her with what she wants, finally thinking to shift her hips against him every time he moved.</p><p>She groans quietly, one hand coming to tangle in Hans’ hair and the other clawing against the smooth bedspread, trying to get some kind of purchase.  </p><p>He finally starts pressing open mouthed kisses around her shoulders and collarbone, half hard and finally just grinding against her clothed warmth. “Please fuck me,” she whispers to him, getting cut off from pleading further when he nips lightly and then sucks hard, marking her neck for sure. She whimpers when he pulls away, rising up to rake his eyes down her form and evaluate his progress. Getting impatient he dives back in to leave more hickies on her neck and sneak his hands up her shirt, leaving a trail of goosebumps in the wake of their feather light touch.</p><p>For somebody who’d seemed quick and efficient in the museum, he was sure taking his sweet time now. She knew she would be bruised and battered in the morning, but each delightfully rough kiss to her skin sent a warm bolt straight to her core. When his hands finally reached her breasts he gave them another light squeeze, chuckling into the crook of her neck when she whined in annoyance and bucked against him for taking so long.</p><p>He pulled back again, his eyes and cocky smirk alone telling her that they had all night, that there was no need to rush. “If you don’t speed this up I’ll take the lead,” she breathes, an empty threat knowing that she had no hope of flipping him over unless he wanted to give up the control. He raises an eyebrow at that, bringing his hands back down to her hips so that he could strip her of her low-cut top.</p><p>His <em>“could you really?” </em>goes unsaid, as she slips out of her shirt with his gentle pulling. “I could,” she insists and both his other eyebrow joins the first as he eyes her with incredulity. She crosses her arms over her barely clothed bosom and pouts up at him. “Let me,” she demands, only for him to stop his wonderful grinding and stand stock still, waiting.</p><p>Puffing her cheeks, she sets to work on his buttons once more, fuming that she couldn’t just rip them off like he did to hers.</p><p>-37-</p><p> </p><p>As much as Hans would love to speed their night up and grind her into dust, rutting into her like he was a real wild dog, he wanted to be pampered and, of course, she needed to be ready for him. He’d never admit he wanted to be cherished like only a human could do, but when she finally managed to undo the rest of his buttons and force his shirt off to the floor, he had to bite back the small, genuine smile that came with her excitement.</p><p>“Kick off your shoes, if you would,” she asks of him, kicking off her own socks and standing from the bed. Hans acquiesces, sitting on the bed and pulling off both his boots and socks. He looks back up to her, eyebrows raised and awaiting his commands.</p><p>“Now,” she purrs, putting her hands to his pecs and pushing against him, “lean back and relax.” He acquiesces again, knowing he could just refuse and watch her lose her mind trying to think of something else, but he much prefers to have her happily straddling his hips and grinding down, teasing against his hardening boner with promises of what comes next.</p><p>She leans own over him, grinding hard in a relaxed pace against him, and presses a kiss to the corner of his lips. And then she presses kisses down his jaw, and his neck, and she even tries to leave a hickie of her own, unknowing that any force she could ever apply would never leave a bruise. So, he just huffs out a happy sigh as her hands trail lower on him, roving across solid muscle in what must be appreciation.</p><p>And she had said <em>he</em> was slow.</p><p>She quickly gives up her love mark endeavor, instead starting to kiss lower and lower. He almost starts for a moment when she moves her hands up to rub circles around his nipples with her thumbs, but then he goes along with it, figuring that it can’t be bad if it doesn’t feel bad. She almost scores a soft groan from him when she kisses her way down and starts to gently suck on one, pinching at the other. Hans gives her a nice hard buck of his hips as a reward, only to find she almost bites down when he threw her off balance.</p><p>Her other hand fists into the bedsheets and she pulls her head up to shoot him a warning glare. “Be nice and save that for when I’m riding you for real,” she scolds, blushing slightly when he gives her a cheeky mock salute for a response. Instead of arguing or going back to teaching Hans about his own body, she gently removes herself from her seat on his pelvis and moves to get off the bed, likely to get down eye level with the uncomfortable tent in his pants.</p><p>Hans, knowing where this is going and figuring that’s far enough—he can’t afford to scare her yet—grabs her hips before she can get too far and pulls her back down, grinding up into her. She gasps and he takes that as an invitation to kiss her, hands sneaking up her back to undo and dispose of her plain skin tone bra.</p><p> -38-</p><p>With her breasts <em>finally</em> free from their cloth prison, [NAME] is all too happy to feel Hans’ hands cup them once more, this time rolling her nipples between his fingers as he kneaded to his heart’s content. She grinds down against him, draping her arms around his neck and sighing happily once he releases her from his kiss and makes his way back down her neck.</p><p>He kisses out from her neck to her shoulder and back again, hands releasing her breasts and running down her sides to rest at her hips for a moment before going for her belt. Unlike the buttons on their shirts, her belt is quick to come undone along with her pants. An excited shiver works its way up [NAME]’s back when she recalls that she’s wearing panties she thought would get him going.</p><p>“Hang on, let me get these off,” she mutters, raising from Hans’ lap to shimmy her jeans off. Hans grumbles in acknowledgement and presses a kiss to the crook of her neck before moving to her other shoulder. If he spared a glance down to see anything she would never know, but he did make sure to give her an exceptionally hard nip, shocking her into an embarrassingly loud moan.</p><p>With an excited, possessive growl he sets about to mark her neck and shoulder with a mosaic of bites, each earning a now more controlled moan or gasp as [NAME] struggles to shift her balance to get her pants over her knees.</p><p>Finally realizing she was about to lose the pants for good, Hans pulls back and his eyes zero in on her red underwear. Time freezes, and his eyes drag lazily up her body, and he licks his lips. [NAME] shudders under his scrutiny, almost jumping out of her skin when his hands, feather light, pull her panties down with her pants and help her balance enough to shake them off, kicking them down to the floor.</p><p>Now completely naked, she flushes and averts her eyes. He brings his hands to rest at the backs of her thighs and she registers that she is now dripping wet, exposed to the unfortunately cool air of the hotel room. It had seemed so much nicer earlier in the day, but that might be part of the reason her room had a fireplace. Even without his touch, her nipples are hard and alert.</p><p>Hans spares a few kisses for her collarbones and the tops of her breasts before lying on his back and pulling her thighs towards him. Suddenly unsure of how quickly they where moving, she drops her hands to his pecs and resists his urge forward, biting her lip and shooting him an anxious look.</p><p>Even without speaking, Hans seemed to get something of what she meant, bringing one hand up to gently stroke her cheek with his thumb and bringing his other around to paw gently at her inner thigh. Slower it was, then.</p><p>She leaned into his gentle touch on her cheek and took a deep breath, which immediately cut off into a squeak when his other hand lazily cupped at her sex. Hans raised an eyebrow at her sudden flip in confidence and huffed out what sounded like a laugh at her squeak. “Don’t be mean,” she grumbles at him before he sticks one long finger between her lips, rubbing along her slit and effectively shutting her up.</p><p>-39-</p><p>He could tell she felt his touch like fire, spreading too hot and too fast out of her control. But that wouldn’t stop his relentless march forward. Progress was still progress, even when slow. His next cue to move came when she started to wriggle against him, desperately searching for more contact. He brings his finger back to the front to lazily stroke around her clit, savoring the welcoming, warm velvet feeling of her against the pad of his finger.</p><p>She turns her face into his hand, pressing a kiss to his palm while she tries to resist the urge to rock against his hand. Not happy with that, he starts to stroke her with more fervor, measuring his effectiveness in how her lips tremble against his other palm.</p><p>He wants to hear his name fall from those lips, damn it.</p><p>He changes his approach, instead moving his fingers back to circle her entrance and letting his thumb attend to her sensitive bundle of nerves. She whimpers for him, finally giving in and rocking against his hand for something, anything. A small victory, he thinks, before finally giving her what she wants and carefully pushing one finger up into her. Ever so slowly, he starts to move in and out.</p><p>She sighs against him, hips gently shifting against his hand. He’s left beating back a groan of his own, fighting the urge to either pull her over his face or lose the pants and start really fucking her. Finding that she is wet and warm and loose enough, he adds a second finger to the first and the moans quietly for him, hips still rocking against the movement of his hand. It’s just barely not enough, he thinks to himself as he curls his fingers inside, searching for something he’d been hard pressed to find even when he was more sexually active.</p><p>He knows he finds it on one stroke when she gasps and her thighs quiver.</p><p>Right on target, he starts pumping his fingers more energetically, relishing when she finally—finally—says his name. <em>“Mmph, Hans—please!” </em></p><p>How polite, he thinks, as he starts to scissor his fingers, working her up for a third digit. She’ll be crying out for him at the end of the night; he’ll make sure of it.</p><p>She finally starts to rock more excitedly against his hand, occasionally sighing when he happens to hit that miracle spot in just the right way. He burns where it is into his memory so he can aim for it later; even her little noises are sweet music to his ears.</p><p>And then he adds a third digit and she is wonderfully warm and wet and tight around his fingers and he can’t wait for later, when she is hot and wet and tight around his member, crying out his name and begging to be <em>his</em>.</p><p>-40-</p><p>“H—Hans!” she stutters his name again, feeling him speed up his pace inside of her as his name falls from her lips. She starts to fully buck her hips against him, feeling every caress and jolt work its way into a tight knot at the base of her pelvis. He pulls out when she starts to shudder around his fingers and she whips her head around to look at him as he licks them in long, sure strokes, cleaning her juices from his digits like he’s a bear savoring honey.</p><p>Drawn in by the lust in his eyes and the need settling inside of her, she shuffles forward on her knees, turning her head to press another kiss into his palm before he pulls it away to settle at the back of her thigh. Bringing her arms up to cover her breasts, as if his new viewing angle may somehow make her ugly in his eyes, she shuffles as far as he urges her, eventually settling her core right over his face.</p><p>She suppresses a shudder when she feels his hot breath fan against her and is reminded of exactly how chilled the room is. In contrast, his hands are warm and big, settling on her hips and urging her to rest against his face. Reluctantly she does, if only for the confidence that his tree-trunk neck can handle it like she’d imagined earlier.</p><p>Just then he turns his face to her inner thigh, pressing a quick, encouraging kiss before leaving a bite that has her squeaking his name. <em>“Hans!”</em></p><p> </p><p>She can feel the pleasant rumble of his chuckle against her and she almost losses it, settling down her weight on top of him like he’d urged her to do. And then in one blessedly languid lick, he trails his tongue from her pussy right to her clit and she shudders.</p><p>And then he does it again, and again, and again, and her thoughts clear from her head. His tongue is as strong as she’d imagined, pushing and dragging and rubbing in all the right ways. Her hands gradually find their way down into his hair, tangling her fingers and giving slight encouraging pulls when he’s exceptionally generous. He growls against her and she gasps, rocking her hips gently against his face.</p><p>In reward, he wraps his lips around her clit and sucks. She knows she’s close when the knot in her core tightens even further and her thighs spasm around his head. “Hans—I th—I think I’m going to come soon,” she pants, unsure if he’d even heard her until one of his hands slips between her legs and she finds he has three fingers in her again, pumping in and out.</p><p>And then the knot pulls itself to resolution, into one single string and she finds release, losing herself against him and chanting his name like a lifeline, thighs and inner walls twitching and spasming around him. He hums around her, earning a particularly loud unintelligible squeak until she finally starts to come down off her high.</p><p>He releases her clit with a loud pop and pulls his fingers out; she can feel him bring them back to his lips, but she has no energy nor will to move, surprisingly drained by what was surely the first orgasm of many that night. His other hand, still resting against the underside of her thigh, squeezes again and lifts her lightly.</p><p>She looks back and sees his now painful looking hard on in his pants and finally pulls off from his face, shuddering at the new chill that replaced his pleasant warmth. “That was wonderful,” she murmurs to him, “could I return the favor?”</p><p>Hans grunts and sits up waving a hand to dismiss her. “Are you sure?” she asks, eyes narrowing as she wonders why he wouldn’t possibly want to be blown. Did he have a visible STD? Did he have some disfigurement she could lovingly help him overcome? He shot her a look and nodded.</p><p>“You don’t, like, have warts or something, right?” She debates asking him to clean his mouth out while she takes a quick break, wondering exactly how rude that would be after he just ate her out. Hans snorts and shakes his head no, unbuttoning his pants and kicking them unceremoniously to the floor with his boxers following close behind.</p><p>[NAME] shuffles up behind him, pressing her boobs into his back, resting her head on top of his, and wrapping her arms around his neck. Hans sighs contentedly, leaning back against her as she looked around in curiosity. His boxers looked ancient, even though they were in otherwise pristine condition, completely off-white and nary a hole or pulled thread. Hell, there wasn’t even a brand or tag to them.</p><p>But then she looks down at him. His dick. Standing at what must be painfully hard attention, she blushes a dark ruby red. Almost like he can feel it—more realistically he probably felt her beath hitch—he laughs. He’s long, and girthy, and full. Her heart hammers excitedly in her chest.</p><p>-41-</p><p>That went well. She saw him, all of him, and still smells aroused. Her heart’s beating harder, and she’s tightened her grip around his neck in anticipation. Either she’s missed the slight bulge at the base or she doesn’t care and she’s into it.</p><p>He can work with either.</p><p>His own pulse spikes slightly when she speaks up again, voice soft and insecure. “Would it be too much to ask for you to take a swig of mouth wash? I don’t think I wanna, you know, taste myself tonight.” Though surprising, it’s not bad. He would’ve found a way to voice the same if he had felt confident in letting her try her hand at him.</p><p>Since he can’t nod without disturbing her very pleasant embrace, he grabs one of her hands and gives it a tight squeeze. “Thanks, big guy,” she mumbles, turning her face down into his hair and pressing a kiss to the top of his head. He’s starting to grow fond of her unofficial nickname for him. He’s also got to be careful the next time she does something soft and human, or else he may very well end up purring; he’s a dog, not a cat, and he’s quite proud of that.</p><p>After a moment her arms drop away from him and she adds “I have a bottle in the bathroom. It’s nice and minty.” Like it would be any other flavor, he thinks when he stands. He can feel her stare burning into him as she watches him walk into the fancy marble bathroom. Something in him swells with pride to note that she was almost drooling for him.</p><p>In another time, in another place, he’d have her choke him down, inch by inch until he’s deep in her throat. The thought makes him twitch in excitement.</p><p>As she promised, there is a bottle of mouthwash sitting on the counter and he rinses as instructed, rolling it around in his mouth for a bit and lamenting the loss of her saccharine taste on his tongue. If he had thought her lips taste of leftover ambrosia, he’d certainly found the font.</p><p>Once he spits everything out he takes a good look at himself in the mirror. The mark where he’d dug out his chip is gone, healed over. He glances out the door into the main hotel room and thinks that he must’ve lost the napkin somewhere, not seeing it anywhere near the haphazardly strewn clothes. Turning his gaze back to the mirror, he laments once more that he’d love to have a mark from her. He’s gone and decorated her skin and will look like his for days to come; it’s an outright shame he can’t return the favor, bear her marks and advertise to the world he’s been claimed by one of their own.</p><p>Before he can spend too much time reflecting and showing his old age, he returns to the main room, turning off the bathroom light as he goes, and eyes the fireplace on the wall. A quick glance to the bed and he notes [NAME] is curled up, eyes closed, on top of the covers, light speckling of goosebumps spread across her skin.</p><p>Fires are romantic, right?</p><p>-42-</p><p>[NAME] only notices that Hans has returned when she hears the hissing and clicking of the gas fireplace igniting. She’s immediately flattered that he’d thought it a good idea to keep her warm but, with a pleasant shudder, the thinks that she would much prefer him to keep her warm.</p><p>Once he’s happy with how it’s burning, nice and bright, he walks over to the wall and flicks off the main light. [NAME] feels the butterflies take off in excitement of what’s to come and she stretches from her curled up position, laying on her front with her torso propped up on her elbows. “I appreciate the fire, but I think a little body heat would go a long way,” she sing-songs, batting her eyelashes as Hans returns to the bed, dropping unceremoniously beside her.</p><p>The quirk of his eyebrow asks if she’s ready to go again, and she nods enthusiastically, rolling over to him so she was on her back. “Take me now, Hans.”</p><p>He snorts at her serious tone before ducking down to press a gentle kiss to her lips. And then another. And another. She sighs happily against him, changing her strategy to nipping and sucking gently at his lower lip. Opening her legs in invitation, [NAME] shimmies back onto the pillows at the head of the bed, forcing Hans to settle between her legs so that he can keep kissing her.</p><p>His hands fall hot and heavy onto her hips, pulling her up against him and, in turn, her hands find their way back into his hair and on the back of his neck. He starts to rub his dick up and down her wet heat, making her mewl into his kisses and her skin crawl in anticipation.</p><p>She wraps her legs around his back, locking her ankles and pulling herself closer, grinding up against him in encouragement. He growls warning into her kisses and keeps rubbing against her slowly, warming himself up to the idea of being inside of her. He paused momentarily, pulling back to look her in the eyes and then at himself and back up to her.</p><p>At the serious look on his face she pauses for a moment before cracking into a bashful smile. “Do your worst and fill me to the brim, <em>Hans</em>,” she says, wiggling her hips against him for emphasis. Raising an eyebrow at her challenge and huffing a sigh, he leans back down to steal a few hot, open mouthed kisses from her before lining himself up with her entrance and pushing just the head in.</p><p>She spasms around him, having tried to mentally prepare for his girth and still being surprised to find him so filling. With a quiet groan into his mouth, she writhes and pulls lightly on his hair as she gradually adjusts to his girth. Taking all of him would be a feat.</p><p>-43-</p><p>Hans finds himself biting back a groan of his own. She was warm and all encompassing, her body bidding him in further as she panted softly beneath him. It really does take all of his mental will to not sheathe himself then and there. He only plunges in bit by bit as her legs pull him in, begging for more.</p><p>It takes what feels like pleasant forever to finally hit his knot, and he decides early on to call that the end of things, even before it swells to inhuman proportions. [NAME] whimpers beneath him, trying to rock her body further onto him before he draws back and she whines, only to cry out his name when he thrusts back in.</p><p>What he wouldn’t give to hear her do that over and over again.</p><p>Stealing one last kiss, he starts to thrust into her at a regular pace; slow and steady to let her adjust. She sighs happily, arching her back into him and curling her toes. He can feel the slight chill on her skin disappear, replaced by his warmth.</p><p>This very well could be a one dog night for her, he figures; he’s all she needs to stay warm, the fire on the other side of the room be damned.</p><p>“Hans,” she breathes, eyes slipping shut and walls clenching around him, “you feel <em>so good.</em>” Hans lowers his face into the crook of her neck and presses a surprisingly gentle kiss, hastening his pace by the smallest fraction to enjoy her mewling. “Harder, faster, please,” she breathes again, lightly pulling on his hair. With a possessive growl he acquiesces, gradually pushing harder and faster until he’s rutting into her at where he thinks the human limit should be.</p><p>At this point she is gasping, quietly chanting his name like a prayer while her thighs spasm around him and her legs pull him closer and her body draws him in. And then he remembers just how he twisted his fingers in her to make her writhe, and he brings her hips up and angles down into her, plowing her into the mattress with as much force and speed as he dares provide.</p><p>She cries his name out this time, loud enough it must carry through the walls. The bedframe is surprisingly sturdy, barely squeaking or groaning as the woman Hans bucks wildly into loses herself to unintelligible moaning. He claims her lips then, greedily swallowing her noises like that will be enough to sustain him through the end.</p><p>He can feel his own orgasm drawing steadily nearer, but he holds his pace and snakes a hand over from her hip to rub at her clit, leaving his darling [NAME] gasping and panting his name in desperation before she hits her edge, tumbling over into orgasmic bliss.</p><p>She tightens around him and Hans feels his thrusts grow desperate, uneven against his self-discipline. Before he can even think of it he releases her mouth and ducks for her shoulder, sinking his teeth in, canines and all, before sinking his full length, knot and all, into her spasming pussy.</p><p>“Hans,” she cries, voice cracking as she shudders around him and under him. And then he, too, joins her in orgasmic bliss with a snarl, teeth locked into her shoulder and knot locked inside of her, hips snapping against her uselessly as he shoots in shot after shot of thick semen.</p><p>-44-</p><p>There was blinding pain for only a moment as he sunk his teeth into the junction between her neck and shoulder like some kind of vampire, but then it was furiously overwhelmed by a vicious orgasm that tore through her in ways she’d never imagined possible. Her vision went white and her whole body spasmed for a few never-ending seconds of rapturous bliss before she came down from her high, the occasional spasm rocking through her body as she recognized something uncomfortable, borderline painful, stuck inside of her.</p><p>It pulsed, with her lover, as spurt after spurt of his juice flowed into her. She wasn’t kidding when she’d said she wanted to be filled, but she hadn’t imagined him capable of the feat in a single go.</p><p>He finally lets her hips fall back into a more normal position, albeit still locked to his. His face is firmly buried in her neck, and he won’t move when she lightly pulls back on him, just to look him in the eye and ask what the hell is happening.</p><p>Quickly figuring out he won’t move and knowing that shifting against the bulbous thing inside her would lead to overstimulation, she starts to card her fingers through his hair. “I think I see why you didn’t want me to suck you off,” she says with a tired laugh, “I don’t think I would have been able to swallow that much.”</p><p>He doesn’t grunt, doesn’t even twitch in reaction to her joke. So she tries again. “I do like that you’ve taken the challenge to fill me quite seriously,” she murmurs to him, slowing down her strokes through his hair and resting one hand on his back.</p><p>After an inhuman pause he takes a deep breath and [NAME] tries another approach. “Thank you for keeping me warm,” she says, wishing she could twist her head at the right angle to give him a soft kiss. “I’m not mad or anything if you were worried about that,” she continues, “but your silence is making me very worried. Did <em>I </em>do something wrong? Please do something, Hans.”</p><p>The only thing he does is work his teeth out of her shoulder. It stings, but she can’t feel any blood trickling out, so she believes it to be a good sign. Taking it as encouragement, she turns her head to kiss his hair. It’s soft and slightly tickles her lips. Somehow, it’s more wispy than before.</p><p>And so she waits in silence, mind wandering to plausible explanations for, well, everything.</p><p>-45-</p><p>She hadn’t done anything wrong beyond taking him to bed, and he really shouldn’t curse her for something that answered a wish for intimacy that he’d never before noticed or considered. If anything, she was to be immeasurably praised: to hear his name <em>over and over</em> without a trace of disgust had filled him, overwhelmed some empty void tucked away and carefully guarded at the center of his chest that has been gradually hollowed out after innumerable years of being called monster, freak, and later, Captain.</p><p>To be connected to her in body and soul was something he knew he did not deserve, feeling waves of tired tranquility lapping at the tentative bond between them. He could stay there forever, savoring the way she felt with him; but all good things end too soon. He was prepared for the possibility of knotting her, but only when he was tied and leaving his mark on her did he realize exactly why he’d been so passionate with the idea of her.</p><p>He had imprinted.</p><p>And then he had mated.</p><p>And now she was bound to him.</p><p>He would have to face the consequences of his actions and figure out what they meant relative to his almost inevitable fate. He would <em>really</em> have to be a crafty bastard, now.</p><p>“You aren’t human, are you?” she asks after an uncharacteristically long pause. He hates how she was right, but he grunts in acquiescence nonetheless. Pulling his face from where it was hidden, he scans her face for the slightest hint of rejection, vibrant red eyes shining in the dark as his ears take on a more wolfish shape and patches of hair grow on his face. Though loathe to admit it, he’d break if she didn’t accept him. </p><p>She startles for a moment, jolting underneath him at the <em>grotesque</em> sight. But then she moves her hands to his cheeks, to hold him still as she evaluates his new appearance in the low light of the fire in the fireplace. Hans supposed he could always throw himself in there if she rejected him outright.</p><p>“Are you a werewolf?” she asks, turning his face from cheek to cheek before taking one hand from his cheek to lightly rub his ear. He hates how he leans into her touch and his eyes slip closed; at the very least she was the only witness to his humiliation. After a moment he just grunts in confirmation and sinks into the same pit of self-loathing that the Major had used to trap him all those years ago.</p><p>“Well isn’t that something,” she goes on, “I guess that makes it a one dog night since you’re keeping me warm.” He snorts a huff of unconvinced laugh in light of her arrival to the exact same conclusion on the matter, but then she doesn’t stop. “Although I think you’re still very much a man in my eyes. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a dog tell a man to fuck off.”</p><p>Despite himself he huffs again, burden on his soul growing lighter as the bond between them pulls some of the weight away. The Major had once said dogs don’t speak, which was part of the inspiration for a werewolf shock collar. Just to spite him, Hans starts digging inside himself again, searching for how to speak and what to say.</p><p>She locks in on the how his mouth twitches and fumbles as he thinks, waiting patiently for him to find his words. “Are you sure?” he eventually croaks, voice raspy and awful, a mockery of the smooth tongue he once had. And mercy, the memory of pain shocks through him again so harshly he winces, vocal cords spasming automatically.</p><p>-46-</p><p>“I am sure,” she replies without a beat of hesitation, stroking his soft, furry cheek with her thumb. He’s gorgeous, but something in the very edges of her mind tells her that he’s damn near inconsolable on the matter. She doesn’t know where it comes from and certainly doesn’t know what to do with it, but figures it has to do with the whole werewolf thing and chalks it up to that. This isn’t really the worst grand flaw he could have had: he could’ve been a Nazi or something. So, she resolves to try and console him anyway.</p><p>And the first step to that, she supposes, if affirmation and validation. She pulls his face closer and kisses his nose. “I don’t even think you’d even need to speak to prove you are a man, you know.” She starts, pecking his lips before continuing. “I don’t think a dog would take me to dinner,” she kisses his left cheek, “Or make sure I was comfortable and having a good time,” she kisses his right cheek, “or agonize over whether they were human.” She finishes with a long kiss to his forehead, mumbling “so you are very clearly a man.”</p><p>When she pulls away she sees him eyeing her doubtfully, mouth drawn into a thinner line than usual. “And it doesn’t matter to me either way,” she adds, “you’re wonderful as you are; you the man and you the wolf.”</p><p>At this he blinks in shock and his mouth falls barely agape, just enough that his hot, vaguely minty breath washes over her face when he exhales. His eyes scan her face for any traces of doubt, and the creeping feeling at the edge of her awareness tells her that he’s mulling things over, trying to figure out whether he trusts her view of him.</p><p>She’s unsure exactly when their evening of debauchery became a time for emotional vulnerability, maybe it was always meant to be like that, but she can’t think of a better way to spend her time quite literally stuck to him. Cracking into a smile she pulls his face forward and gives him a quick peck, and then another, and another, and soon she’s speckling his face with them, only stopping when he takes initiative and presses a warm kiss to her lips. Something again pokes at the borders of her awareness. Gratitude? Affection? Both; and a bit of melancholy.</p><p>On the tails of this realization is another: she’s no longer almost splitting in two. Sure, she’s still completely full of a slightly softer Hans and his cum, but whatever other thing was going on had shrunk back down to a more tolerable size. Smiling devilishly into their kiss, she grinds her hips into him.</p><p>-47-</p><p>[NAME] realizes his knot has shrunk before he does, giving him a pleasant start when she shifts, obviously signaling that she wants to go again. He breaks their kiss, hands tightening their grip on her hips while he starts to grind back against her, and shoots her the best questioning look he can. As unlikely as it was for his strain of lycanvirus to transmit or leave alive, it was still a possibility that increased with exposure. He wouldn’t exactly vocalize this—it was low enough it beat down the possibility of a fully werewolf army even after continuous exposure to his blood with the <em>best</em> medical personnel available—but he still wanted to know she wanted him.</p><p>To be wanted was a wonderful feeling.</p><p>She hummed for a moment, arching her back to get as close to him as possible. “As much as I loved what we just did,” she breathes, “can I top this time?” Somehow, this was better than being wanted.</p><p>Hans, in the merry belief that it would be wonderful to watch her ride him, nods exactly once, thinly concealed excitement shining in his eyes and body responding amicably, dick starting to harden back into a force to be reckoned with once more. [NAME] hums happily before releasing her ankles at his back, allowing Hans to quickly extract himself and settle down beside her, lying on his back with his hands folded across the hard planes of his stomach.</p><p>He looks over just on time to see her flush when she sits up, a mixture of their cum dripping out in generous quantities. “Oops,” she squeaks, likely thanking that these weren’t her sheets long term, and quickly straddles him once more, slick now dripping more on him than on the bed.</p><p>He didn’t mind.</p><p>“Do you, uh, have anything left, big guy,” she asks, settling her hands on his abdomen and crouching low, just barely teasing the head of his now rock hard cock against her soaked folds. All in all she’s a wonderful view, Hans thinks, grunting at her as if to say <em>of course. </em>Her flush still bright on her cheeks, she spares a hand to move between her legs and grabs his dick hesitantly, trying to align him with her entrance.</p><p>Hans watches this happen, lust clouding his eyes as he lays perfectly still. The second she’s got him in position and starts to lower down on him, he can’t resist grabbing her hips with his inhuman speed and bucking up into her, earning a surprised yelp from the woman now sitting on top of him.</p><p>They drop back to the bed and she shudders, nails lightly dragging against his skin as she clenches her fist. “That was mean,” she scolds between pants, “v—very mean.”</p><p>Hans can only bring himself to smirk at her, her body having taken him to the hilt so easily. She pouts, wrapping her arms around her breasts and refusing to voice anything else out loud as her thighs and pussy twitch around him. That had clearly felt good: very, very good.</p><p>-48-</p><p>Taking a deep breath to steady herself, [NAME] lowers one arm and puts a stabilizing hand back on his abs. It didn’t matter if he was a man or a monster because he was one thing above all else: a troublemaker. A very handsome troublemaker, granted, but still nothing but trouble.</p><p>She breathes out and then starts bouncing at a slow pace, eyes glued to his pecs for fear of what his smile will do. His hands, still big and warm, sit comfortably on her hips and she finds herself thinking, for a moment, that they damn well belonged there. They move with her as she bounces slowly, testing the waters and trying to keep her boobs from bouncing too much.</p><p>Glancing up to Hans’ face, she notes he’s still got that heart stopping smile and his eyes are locked on her still red blush, soaking her in with a very entertained shine to his eyes. If it weren’t for bright red eyes glowing in the low light or the extra wisps of hair on his cheeks she’d have assumed for sure he was a man  at first glance.</p><p>She looks away once more and he starts to rock his hips against her to match her pace, scoring a soft sigh from her. “You fill me up so well,” she mumbles to him, “and you feel so <em>good</em>.” There’s an unspoken <em>I could never have anyone else after this</em>. Like he hears her, loud and clear, he spares one of his warm, wonderful hands from her hip to hold her chin, turning her to face him.</p><p>His cocky smirk is gone, replaced with a small, genuine smile. He winks at her and gives her a hard bounce before she can stutter anything out to him, and she moans happily, starting to pick up her pace at his insistence. Dropping his hand back down, he snakes it between her legs and presses a knuckle to her clit, rubbing against her as she bounces on top of him.</p><p>Starting to pant, she drops her other arm from her breasts—allowing them to bounce freely, much to Hans’ viewing pleasure—and puts her other hand on his abs as well. She picks up her pace, coil forming again at the center of her core between being stretched to her limit around Hans’ girth and his attention to her clit.</p><p>He makes another surprise buck into her and she gasps his name, hands sliding up to his pecs as she leans forward, back arching into him slightly. Hans apparently takes this as a cue to wrestle back control, firmly grasping both of her hips and starting to buck into her with renewed excitement. She feels herself shudder around him, his name falling from her lips over again as she pleads—faster—harder—fill me—more.</p><p>And as usual, Hans delivers in full: back to testing her limits with his pace and strength, bruising her hips under his harsh grip. She feels the base of his dick start to swell again, a sure sign that she would be taking his knot soon. “Put it in me,” she begs, “come in me! I need it, Hans!”</p><p>His thrusting starts to grow erratic until, finally, he bucks into her, hard, and locks into her again. She gasps, savoring the feeling of his warm seed pumping into her.</p><p>-49-</p><p><em>She had begged for it</em>, and that was what put him over the edge. Not the wonderful feeling of her walls caressing him or her tits bouncing with every thrust. But she wanted him to knot her badly enough to beg, and who was he to deny her?</p><p>He bucks fruitlessly against her a few more times, stuffing her with his knot and making her shudder around him.  If she wanted to be filled, he would make sure it happens. Sparing a hand from her hips once more he starts to rub at her clit again, savoring how she pants until she comes undone around him, squeezing his knot as if trying to milk him further.  And he keeps rubbing, her cry fading into desperate moaning and groaning as her body shakes uncontrollably on top of him, another orgasm rocking through her in short time.</p><p>“Hans—” she chokes out, clouded eyes desperately searching his face. He finally cuts her some slack and pulls his hand back, figuring that while he’d finally paid her back for her coy act in the restaurant, he still had a way to go before filling her to the brim. Unable to form words, she rests as best she can against his knot, panting and occasionally shivering from the cold air or an occasional shock when his knot throbs.</p><p>He sits up gently, trying to avoid stirring her up too much, and clasps his hands together behind her, effectively holding her to his chest. Pressing a quick kiss to her lips, he pulls back to watch as her shocked gasp pulls back together into a tired, post-orgasm smile. Her eyes are slightly clouded over, and he knows that she’s probably spent after that.</p><p>“You were in<em>cred</em>ible Hans,” she slurs, dropping her head against his shoulder. “And you fill me so well.” As if to accentuate her point, she spasms around him once more. He hums quietly in acknowledgement of her point and waits a moment more before swinging his legs over the edge of the bed, managing to keep them locked together, save for a little pulling that has her whimpering in his ear.</p><p>Burning that sound into his mind, he stands, holding her at just the right height to keep from pulling too hard. She reaches up lazily, putting her arms around his neck as much as she could before he starts the very careful waddle into the bathroom.</p><p>Without even sparing a hand to turn the light on—not that he needed it—he brings her right over to the bathtub and carefully lowers her to the edge before pulling his knot out in one swift, smooth motion. She yelps and his seed starts to spill out of her, smeared against her thighs and dripping down the side of the tub. He gives her a soft kiss for her troubles and turns his attention to the faucet, drawing a warm bath.</p><p><em>A bath—another luxury he hasn’t had in decades. </em>Now she was pampering him for sure.</p><p>Grumbling unintelligibly under her breath, she closes her legs and swivels around, dropping her feet into the water to enjoy the warmth as the water rises. Hans sits down beside her, feet in the water and clearing his head of all thought.</p><p>“Hey, Hans,” [NAME] speaks up, “what happens tomorrow?” He feels a pang of something forlorn across their new bond, hidden under her immediate exhaustion. Shrugging, he wraps a reassuring arm around her and holds her to his side, accepting that there was a decision to be made.</p><p>[NAME] or the Major? He wishes he knew what he should pick. On one hand, she’s his <em>mate</em> and he’s got a lot of unexplored territory with her. But on the other hand, he’s still bound to the Major by powerful fae magic. There’s probably nothing he could do to break it, save for find somebody to kill the Major for him.</p><p>Heaving a heavy sigh, he turns and presses a kiss to the top of her head, pushing the thoughts away. That is a problem for tomorrow. It’ll do neither of them any good worrying about it tonight.</p><p>-50-</p><p>[NAME] leans into his comforting touch. It was a bad idea to bring that up, she thinks, because it’s soured the time she has left with him. <em>What happens tomorrow? </em>She’d asked like he could abandon his life for her, or she for him. Catching feelings was an awful, unintentional decision.</p><p>She wraps her arm around him after a moment of pause and blinks away the small, fruitless tears gathering in her eyes. Tomorrow is the day to worry about it, she thinks, she’s far too tired to look objectively at the problem now.</p><p>Her other hand reaches up to touch lightly at the deep bite mark he left on her shoulder. It doesn’t hurt—doesn’t feel like much, actually, but it’s still there. At least she’ll have that to remember him by for a while. And maybe his flannel shirt, if he leaves that. She’ll have to fix the buttons up, but that’s easy.</p><p>The idea of mending his clothing—something so innocent and domestic—sends a harsh pang through her chest. How awful that she couldn’t stop thinking about it.</p><p>Hans presses another kiss into the top of her head, tightening his grip around her. <em>Please stop thinking,</em> she says to herself, <em>and just enjoy it</em>. So, she clears her head, focuses on nothing but his warmth beside her and the rising water.</p><p>Once it’s high enough, Hans shuts the tap off and slips in, inviting her to settle on his lap. She leans back against him when she’s in, trying to savor how he seems to engulf her, wrapping both arms against her and pressing gentle kisses into her shoulders. When he presses a kiss to the harsh bite, she feels the tide at the edge of her mind wash just further in, carrying with it knowledge that he is in the midst of the same conflict.</p><p>His hands sneak back between her legs and she sighs softly when he starts to clean her out in the warm water, undoing all of his hard work in the most caring way. She almost falls asleep against him, then, gentle and warm and made of dreams. The next thing she realizes is when he’s shifting her out of his lap to stand, and all she can bring herself to do is sit in the tub and wait for him to scoop her up and wrap her in a towel, gently drying her off.</p><p>He carries her back into the bedroom proper and sets her on the bed, leaving her to shed her towel and burrow under the covers. She hears the tub start to drain in the other room and rubs her legs together, shivering under the cool sheets. In a flash he slips in beside her and wraps an arm around her, pulling her into his warm side and chasing her chills away, if only for a night.</p><p>Knowing she doesn’t have much longer in the waking world, she presses a small kiss into the side of his pec. “Goodnight, Hans,” she whispers, cutting off the pathetic and not at all surprising <em>I love you</em> that’s supposed to go with it.</p><p>-51-</p><p>He squeezes her gently, feeling those unspoken three magic words wash over him in the most tender way possible. God, she loves him. There is an angel in this world trying to trick him away from marching into hell right behind the devil himself.</p><p>Digging for his words once more, he manages to return a quiet, broken “Goodnight, [NAME],” of his own. He feels her heartbeat pick up and then drop off again as she finally falls asleep. And he lies awake rubbing circles into her side with his thumb to soothe himself. How selfish.</p><p>In a blink, Schrodinger is standing at the bedside next to him, the ghost of fear settled in his dark eyes. “Captain,” he whispers before raising his hand, Hans’ dog tag clutched tightly in his palm.</p><p>If Hans eyes weren’t playing tricks on him, he’d have thought Schrodinger’s lip was quivering for a second.</p><p>He grunts, reaching out his hand to take his tag from the young boy, noting closely how hesitant he is to pass them over. And just like that, Hans is sent back to when Schrodinger was just a young child—it was just as the war was ending; they were fleeing to South America with the help of the Catholic Church. Doc picked him up as another easily excused orphan child for a quick, on the road experiment and the rest was history.</p><p>Nobody else had looked after him as a kid. Hans had sort of tried to, keeping a close eye on him until he adjusted into the awful little shit he was today. He curses himself for immediately wondering if [NAME] would be a good mother for him; would have raised him right and given him the love and support he needed. And what would she do now, when the scared forever child drops Hans’ tag into his hand and curls in on himself like a housecat abandoned on a cold, rainy night?</p><p>The Major must be livid. There had been a time, further from the fruition of their plan, when he would’ve delighted at Hans’ wild, extreme insubordination. But not this time. <em>We have a war to wage, Captain. </em>And he would have known Schrodinger helped—there was too slim a chance for silver to randomly make its way into his possession.</p><p>After a moment of consideration, Hans takes his tag and presses it into one of [NAME]’s hands, finding with a small degree of relief that she grasps it in her sleep. That taken care of, he turns his gaze back to Schrodinger, who looks at him desperately with fidgeting hands. For the Major to be so furious at him, too, there must be an awful surprise waiting for them both.</p><p>He knows what the boy wants and, arguably, needs.</p><p>It was funny to think that the catboy had once crawled shamelessly into bed next to him and stayed the night—afraid of the dark, he said. Hans had never questioned it and let him stay. [NAME] probably would have done the same thing, albeit with more hugging. Maybe that was the right thing to do now.</p><p>He may have been alive for over 50 years, but Schrodinger was still a child at heart. And so Hans reluctantly pats the blankets on his open side and Schrodinger all but dives into him, scrambling to get onto the bed while causing as little disturbance as possible. He presses right up to Hans’ side, ducking his head against his chest and curling into a ball.</p><p>He really was like a child, all these years later.</p><p>[NAME] grumbles softly for a moment and shifts in Hans’ grip at the disturbance, quickly slipping back into peace once she’s comfortable again.  Schrodinger peeks over Hans’ chest, eyeing her cautiously before settling in again, gears turning in his head in a way Hans could never predict. After a moment, he whispers “Thank you, Captain.”</p><p>Hans waits another moment before correcting him. “Hans,” he grits out, putting aside his duty as a Captain of Millennium. No; if only just for tonight he was Hans, mate to [NAME] and shitty adoptive father to Schrodinger. Tomorrow, he would be the Captain and deal with whatever the Major had to throw at him.</p>
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